well, big betsy finally came in after 2 months, ordered even before i had a 3rd gen lined up and bought.
i will do a small how to but i was not into extreme detail with pictures. i will provide the links i had used to help install the bumper.
i started by taking off the bumper. there will be 2 12MM nuts to take of on both left and right fenderwells facing the front of vehicle. after taking those off, i unbolted the 4 17mm bolts connecting the tow hooks on the bottom side of the frame. after that i unbolted the 4 14mm that hold the OEM brushguard to the bumper and had help from another guy remove bumper at my shop i work at. you are left with this.
you then need to cut the framehorns at the weld, and then grind smooth the weld splatter and weld itself. ive seen people remove this using a cutoff disk and grinder, a plasma cutter, and i chose to use my milwauke corded bandsaw and went right down the frame with perside accuracy. this took me maybe 3 minutes for both sides. I had used a file to smoothen everything out ensuring it would not be easy to cut my hands.
i had fitment issues with the two front body mounts hitting the bumper support and had to cut a section off the bumper rather than grind more of the frame for better strength. I unfortunately did not capture that but it seems as if sometimes they have clearance issues and sometimes they dont, and i had to.
after making necessary fitment modifications, i bolted the frame support using the 4 17mm bolts you use to take off the bumper and tightened snugly. you then have to look on the bottom side of frame . facing up and see that there is a hole you have to drill. this hole needs to be drilled to 1/2" on each side to fit the long bolts with the sleeve. after that this is what i ended up with.
on the last picture i show the gap between the support and frame. from all the videso and threads i have seen people have to fit with a hammer but mine slid in with eas and i have an 1/8th inch gap? i was thinking thats the jigs used to weld the frame could vary and so on so i rolled with it and proceeded. if anyone could shed light i would appreciate it.
you then need to put buffer kit on the bumper and in this case i have a brand new smittybuilt x20 10,000 synthetic winch and installed it to the bumper. i assembled the winch and fairlead, bolting it in via the bolts given in the winch kit and fits with ease; i have seen people with other smittybuilts have clearence issues but i had no issues for whatever reason. due to the control box wires being so short i did not want to but the box in a goofy spot, therefore i had made a custom mound by drilling holes and taking measurements to make it all even. i secured the control box wires onto the winch and tested the winch and verified proper working order. you then install the bumper via 6 medium length bolts. this is how it ended up
unfortuneatly i had to cut the grill in order to fit the custom box mount
oh well it looks very clean IMO. i will get pictures later i might go wheeling tomorrow. but anyways let me know what you guys think of the writeup even though it wasnt in crazy step by step detail. these are links i had used to help installation
YouTube
YouTube