tre9er
New member
Call me crazy, but I prefer the simple, non-fat-lip stylings of the pre-99 front bumpers on these here 3rd gens. I own a 2002, though :noidea:. So I bought one from a guy for very little and did the swap Saturday morning.
Tools:
12,14mm sockets (I used deep-wells for the side mounts
)
WD-40 or PB Blaster for stubborn bolts that you'll probably just cut off anyway :uzi:
Pliers or vice grips (optional)
It's super easy, but you'll want to make sure the pre-99 bumper has it's two main mounting brackets for an easy bolt-on install. First you'll want to remove the plugs for your turn signals and fog lights, if you have fogs. Then remove the old bumper. In the pic below you'll see where the new bumper mounts (and also this is where you'll remove bolts from the old for removal)
On youre 99+ bumper you won't have two bolts right there. You'll have one bolt there and another one (or two?) higher up. But there is a welded nut in both locations, so you're good.
On the sides of the 99+ bumper there are these two mounts with bushings on them. Someone can help me out here, because these things gave me hell. You go to loosen either nut and the mounts and/or your T4R body itself start bending and twisting. I ended up cutting one of them off to get it out of there and had to use rubber mallet to straighten out sheet metal. Again, I'll edit this here when someone has a handy tip on how to remove those in a better fashion.
Oh, there's also two bolts per side holding the bottom of the valance on. You'll figure that out if you forget, because the bumper will come off, then flip down and you'll see the valance still attached
Once you've got the old bumper off, you'll also need to remove this cross-member dealio here:
Your pre-99 bumper won't clear this. I'm planning on fabbing up something simple to replace it though, that doesn't protrude so much yet adds a smidgin of backup support should I get into a front-end collision. Basically I'd just cut off the mounting plates (on bottom, touching ground in above pic) and maybe weld on some square tubing or i-beam or something. Again, not much, but would be nice to have something there. At this point I feel like if I tapped a sapling my radiator would explode.
Now mount the new bumper in reverse order that you removed the old, yadda yadda, easy stuff. Note that you need to push the bumper up and get it lined up where you want it before you snug the bolts down, there is some play.
I used zip-ties on the sides in place of the old busing-PITA side mounts. Again, prefer something more sturdy and will probably fab up some sort of l-bracket there this week. I'll try to edit this when I come up with something.
Here's where it gets fun. You can actually use your stock turn signal bulb-housings (and you'll want to so it's plug-and-play, the plugs are different in the pre-99).
Remove the bulbs in the older model bumper, twist the old sockets out and pull off the rubber grommet/washer. You'll be using the latter. Fit it on your stock sockets (after you've twisted them out of the newer model bumper). You'll now have two rubber washer thingies (technical term).
The reason for this is that if you just use the one washer, the socket wobbles all around in there and it's not a snug fit, it would probably fall out of the housing. Now, the notches don't look exactly the same, but try to line them up by size in the housing the best you can and give it a mild push in, then I used vice grips to twist it in. It doesn't take much, but my hands were greasy from all the WD-40 I tried on the aforementioned side bumper mounts :lasercannon:
I'm really pleased with the way it turned out.
Before:
After
Note I didn't put my flare extensions on the new (old) bumper yet. I may not at all. I don't think it looks bad, in fact from the side it looks natural. From the front it only looks out of place if you're looking for them. In fact I think I've seen several older Tundras and some other models that don't even have the flares on the bumper, much like mine in the pic above.
What do you think? Should I add them? Not really looking forward to drilling holes for them, and then that means the bumper is useless to sell to anyone who doesn't have limited flares.
Tools:
12,14mm sockets (I used deep-wells for the side mounts
)WD-40 or PB Blaster for stubborn bolts that you'll probably just cut off anyway :uzi:
Pliers or vice grips (optional)
It's super easy, but you'll want to make sure the pre-99 bumper has it's two main mounting brackets for an easy bolt-on install. First you'll want to remove the plugs for your turn signals and fog lights, if you have fogs. Then remove the old bumper. In the pic below you'll see where the new bumper mounts (and also this is where you'll remove bolts from the old for removal)
On youre 99+ bumper you won't have two bolts right there. You'll have one bolt there and another one (or two?) higher up. But there is a welded nut in both locations, so you're good.
On the sides of the 99+ bumper there are these two mounts with bushings on them. Someone can help me out here, because these things gave me hell. You go to loosen either nut and the mounts and/or your T4R body itself start bending and twisting. I ended up cutting one of them off to get it out of there and had to use rubber mallet to straighten out sheet metal. Again, I'll edit this here when someone has a handy tip on how to remove those in a better fashion.
Oh, there's also two bolts per side holding the bottom of the valance on. You'll figure that out if you forget, because the bumper will come off, then flip down and you'll see the valance still attached
Once you've got the old bumper off, you'll also need to remove this cross-member dealio here:
Your pre-99 bumper won't clear this. I'm planning on fabbing up something simple to replace it though, that doesn't protrude so much yet adds a smidgin of backup support should I get into a front-end collision. Basically I'd just cut off the mounting plates (on bottom, touching ground in above pic) and maybe weld on some square tubing or i-beam or something. Again, not much, but would be nice to have something there. At this point I feel like if I tapped a sapling my radiator would explode.
Now mount the new bumper in reverse order that you removed the old, yadda yadda, easy stuff. Note that you need to push the bumper up and get it lined up where you want it before you snug the bolts down, there is some play.
I used zip-ties on the sides in place of the old busing-PITA side mounts. Again, prefer something more sturdy and will probably fab up some sort of l-bracket there this week. I'll try to edit this when I come up with something.
Here's where it gets fun. You can actually use your stock turn signal bulb-housings (and you'll want to so it's plug-and-play, the plugs are different in the pre-99).
Remove the bulbs in the older model bumper, twist the old sockets out and pull off the rubber grommet/washer. You'll be using the latter. Fit it on your stock sockets (after you've twisted them out of the newer model bumper). You'll now have two rubber washer thingies (technical term).
The reason for this is that if you just use the one washer, the socket wobbles all around in there and it's not a snug fit, it would probably fall out of the housing. Now, the notches don't look exactly the same, but try to line them up by size in the housing the best you can and give it a mild push in, then I used vice grips to twist it in. It doesn't take much, but my hands were greasy from all the WD-40 I tried on the aforementioned side bumper mounts :lasercannon:
I'm really pleased with the way it turned out.
Before:
After
Note I didn't put my flare extensions on the new (old) bumper yet. I may not at all. I don't think it looks bad, in fact from the side it looks natural. From the front it only looks out of place if you're looking for them. In fact I think I've seen several older Tundras and some other models that don't even have the flares on the bumper, much like mine in the pic above.
What do you think? Should I add them? Not really looking forward to drilling holes for them, and then that means the bumper is useless to sell to anyone who doesn't have limited flares.
Last edited:
