pontoontodd

You really need to save up for a rust free car. You can probably fit 70mm spacers but as you go up your CVs will just wear out faster and your boots will be more likely to tear. I think 50mm is considered the most you can lift safely with just strut spacers and have decent CV life. You can compensate for your camber when you build the spacers, just offset them. You should be able to find the right amount to do it online. Or you could tack weld them, assemble, and check alignment a few times and figure it out the hard way.

Sounds like what you need is a Raptor. You're going to be making payments either way. Should be reliable, fast, excellent ride quality, etc.

Those Cherokees are common around here, I have seen them for sale locally with good tires, winch, sometimes even better axles for $2000. You would love it, you can go very slow and it has real 4WD. It's the sort of thing you should be saving your money for when your current Outback gets too rusty to fix. The ride quality is terrible. Supposedly there is one long travel kit you can get for them that works well but I haven't seen it in person. I have also seen people who use them for desert racing or prerunning swap in a twin traction beam front suspension and drive out of a Ford but that's a lot of work.

You're welcome. One more thing I should have pointed out is the late model 6MT in the Crosstrek, etc is similar to the 5MT and nothing like the 6MT in the STI.

So it looks like you have a 3.9 final drive. This is mostly from memory so check elsewhere before acting on any of this advice. A 6MT swap out of an STI wouldn't be too bad. Make sure to get one with 1:1 rear transfer gears to work with your 3.9 final drive. The crossmember/mount is different but not a lot. You would probably need a shorter driveshaft. Front axles fit I think. I have read about some people using their five speed push type clutch but I'm not sure how that would work, you might need a 6MT STI flywheel/clutch/pressure plate/release bearing/starter. You'd want the 6MT shifter. The earlier (pre 2004) 6MTs from Japan are cheaper but weaker since they have a viscous center diff. I haven't looked into them too closely, but the late model 6MT (Crosstrek, etc) looks like it uses a different shifter than the 5MT, doesn't have a VSS, and I think they're all 4.44 final drive. If the original trans lasted a quarter million miles and you just want something similar but fresh and you're not doing anything abusive to the car, I'd stick with the 5MT. I don't know if that trans has a cable speedo or a speed sensor (VSS) but I think they are interchangeable without splitting the trans. Regardless you'd need a trans with a VSS or you'll probably piss off the ECU. So that means before 2009, depends on the model. After that they not only didn't machine the case for the VSS, they didn't machine third/fourth gear to drive it. I think in about 2000 or 2005, again depending on model, they went to the front CV axles with male splines at the trans. If you get one of those transmissions, which would likely have less wear and tear than an older trans, you'd either have to get the later model CV axles to go with it which probably use different ABS sensors or get transmission stubs from a 4EAT or STI 6MT (fairly cheap from the dealer). If you go with the stubs you'll either need to swap in smaller seals or get bearing sleeves (that's what mine did but I think they leak a little). I got lucky with the last trans I bought, it had been sitting at a junkyard for a decade. It was out of a crash test car so it only had 52 miles on it. You can sort by mileage on car-part.com. JDM should work too as far as I know, haven't looked into that for 5MT. Your easiest and safest bet would be to figure out what 5MTs have 3.9 final drive. Secondary concern would be the other ratios but check on those. You can find some info on cars101.com. jdmfsm.info has factory service manuals, those should have ratios. You can also look up individual models/years on subarupartwholesale.com. One convenient thing about that is you can pick a complete trans or just the ring and pinion gear and find other models/years with the same trans or R&P. For instance looking up the 3.90 front R&P: https://www.subarupartwholesale.com/p/Subaru_1995_Legacy-22L-MT-4WD-Brighton-Wagon/GEAR-SET-HYPOID/49247774/38100AB310.html (click on what this fits) Once you narrow it down a bit start looking on car-part.com for a local low mileage trans. Again if the original trans lasted 25 years you can probably get one from a junkyard with 100-150k miles on it for $500 or less that will last you a decade or so.

Took the rear diff out of the car and confirmed those gear teeth came from the spider gears. Side note, it's really best to just remove both rear CV axles completely rather than just one and trying to get the diff out with the other axle still attached to the knuckle, even with the strut out. Looked for most of a week and couldn't get a 4.11 with VLSD. The only yard that I think had one never got back to me about shipping. So I looked it up and the 2002(?) Outback EJ25 4EAT rear subframe I have in my backyard is a 4.44 with VLSD. Thought about putting a 4.44 trans in the car and using it but decided against it for various reasons. One is that I still want to do the 6MT/R180 swap over the winter which should solve these problems. So I took the VLSD out of that rear end. The side gears are flanged or webbed so they should be much stronger. Unfortunately the idler gears don't look any stronger than the open diff, hopefully this thing will last eight months or so. My friend brought over the 4.11 open rear end from his 2000 Forester. Despite the fact that he's been soaking the bolts with penetrant for the last few days about half of them broke off. Fortunately I was able to thread most of them out with vise grips but I did have to drill and tap a few holes. So I made one good diff out of two good diffs and put it in the car. Haven't driven it much as I want to address the front structure but seems to work fine and makes no obvious bad sounds. Ran it with some cheap gear oil, drained it after driving a bit, oil came out clean.

C obtained two free Jeeps that had sat for two years from the house next to his dad's when it got foreclosed. They towed them both behind a truck to their shop to work on them. The rear Jeep was in decent shape and had brakes but they were dragging. While towing suddenly the brakes on the rear Jeep freed up and it surged forward so he hit the brakes. This nearly pulled the middle Jeep in half. C put a $35 junkyard battery in it, hotwired the security system, and started it with a screwdriver. Convoyed with C's crew to Badlands off road park on Saturday. Went to the big parking lot to unload and set up flags, R got there shortly after we did. Cherokee cranked fine but wouldn't start. C had read the capacitors on the ECU go bad. He pulled the ECU out of it and one of the capacitors did look bad. He dug the potting out from around the capacitor and we robbed one out of the radio. Z soldered the radio capacitor in place and the Jeep fired up. C bagged the ECU and beat on it all afternoon. The red Chevy pickup quickly died, it had a flat tire and a bad CV joint among other issues. On the way to the stream we stopped by the small figure 8 to air up the Cherokee's leaking tire. It had gravel under the bead, a can of fix a flat didn't help, eventually it came completely off the bead and then we were able to air it back up and it held all day. While we were doing that a couple guys pulled up in a brand new Wrangler and we convinced them to take a lap of the figure 8. He swore it was a rental from Hertz. We ran the stream and then went back to the parking lot to get the ATV. Hit both the figure eights, dragon tail, etc. Most of the time the Cherokee was running hot so we had to keep letting it cool off and add water. Dumped in a bottle of head gasket fix which may have helped. Battery wasn't clamped down and broke the top of the coil off, so that got zip tied on and came loose occasionally. Rental Jeep was stuck on a narrow uphill climb and started to slide towards a tree. R tried to pull him down and to the side but the Jeep slid right next to the tree. I pulled up and set up the winch, put a snatch block on the opposite side of the trail and winched him back up on the trail. C tried a similar climb and slid down into some small trees and brush and got stuck. I ripped his rear bumper off with the strap, looked like it was just held on by two screws. After that he was able to back out under his own power. Then C decided we should hit some jumps. He hit the pointy one at the top of the hill I'd hit at 40 in the Outback a year or two ago. Hit it at about 35 in the Cherokee and nosedived badly but survived. Then I was going to hit the uphill flat jump in the Outback, set up the cameras, C got in, and we quickly realized the rear spider gears were broken. Towed that back to the parking lot. About this point the ATV wasn't running so we just went trail riding in the three remaining vehicles. Got back to the concrete hill climb which is rougher than it was a few years ago and a little wet/muddy. R tried a few times with the low range without success, had to hit it with momentum and got to the top. C got up with a lot of throttle and momentum in the Cherokee. Z didn't like the looks of it since the Forester XT is still mostly stock and riding on city boy tires. Had him drive up about halfway to the big hole and stop. Then C pulled him up with the Cherokee. Ran down the rock pile and the rest of that trail. Hooked the Outback up to the Forester and flat towed it home. Think I found a rear diff with 4.11 and LSD. From pictures I've seen the spider gears in those look stronger. If nothing else a relatively fresh one should last me the rest of the year and I can do the 6MT/low range/R180 conversion next winter.

This is what the trailing arm mount looked like. This part had completely rusted off. Cleaned off rust, paint, and undercoating. There was also a small crack just behind the trailing arm mount. 1/8" mild steel plates to cover the hole and spread the load. I welded these sleeves to the top plate so the bolts had something solid to tighten against. Welded the plates in place. Welded the bottom one to the inside of the rocker panel which probably helps tie the body together. At the top of the picture you can see where part of the weld for the top plate burned through the undercoating. The other side looks fine for now but I'll probably do this to the other side over the winter.

Yes, the 35mph landing was fine, the 40mph landing was harsh so I stopped there.

Drove all day down to Florida on Monday. The next morning I visited a customer. On the way home I pulled off in the woods at some jumps I found in north Florida and checked the trailing arm bracket. Still seemed rock solid so I hit a few jumps. Filmed one uphill jump at 25, 30, 35, and 40mph. All of the trails in that area are covered in jumps, every few hundred feet there is a jump of some kind. Could be over 100 within a couple miles of there.

Went to Arkansas for another weekend of trail riding. Met travelvw on the way down. Met slammo and J just north of the Buffalo River and travelvw led the way from there. From left to right, my 99 Outback, R's long travel Forester w/ dual range, slammo, and travelvw's WRX with KYB AGX struts and King lift springs. One of the first trails he took us down had this sign at the start and it wasn't lying. We were driving fast on some rocky roads by the Buffalo River. I only rode in it for a little while but the WRX rode much better than stock over rocks and dips at speed. A little harsh on the little stuff and not as smooth as our long travel struts at speed but a huge improvement for the money. The road/trail to Eden falls/cave was closed so we continued along the river towards a campsite he had in mind. We hiked out to Whitaker point / Hawksbill and I found a skink and some salamanders and we saw a pileated woodpecker. Next we decided to hike to Glory Hole Falls. This dude was all flexed out in the parking area. We drove the trail down to the campsite in the dark. I was driving the Outback following everyone else and we went over about thirty jumps on the way down. Travelvw and slammo were driving slow, partially due to birds in the road, so I was only able to hit a few with enough speed to get air but when we got to camp we decided that first thing Saturday morning we'd have to get some video of some of them. The road we took down crossed the river but was too deep for us to cross at that time. That night it got down to 20F and some of the water left outside was frozen in the morning. We hit a bunch of the jumps on the way out, not too many of them had smooth and straight landing areas but we got some video (see pictures above from travelvw) and took turns giving everyone rides on the best downhill jump. Hit one small jump in my 99 Outback and the front dug into the dirt and hit a big rock. It was a hard hit and we immediately noticed the wipers scraping on the windshield. We stopped to bend them back up. I broke the passenger side wiper arm and someone noticed oil running out the front of the car. We pulled over for a couple hours. Fixed the wiper arm with some hose clamps and a wrench we'd found on the trail. Pulled off all the skidplates and patched up the hole in the timing cover with some minute epoxy. It was very runny and then would suddenly cure so it was tricky to work with but we basically stopped the leak, didn't have to add oil the rest of the week. Skidplate crimped the coolant hose going to the oil cooler too. Slammo clearanced the skidplate with a sawzall. We put the skidplates back on and got back on the trail and back to hitting jumps. The last trail Slammo had us on followed a deep, wide stream with maybe a dozen crossings. We had come to both ends of it last year and decided to turn around after coming to some of the crossings and never saw the worst part. This time we drove the whole thing. At one point slammo was following the only obvious path which turned sharply out of the stream up a bank and he shortly figured out it wasn't the correct path, seemed on foot like it dead ended. We then spent a couple hours getting all four cars back down off that bank and through a rocky streambed. We used slammo's ramps to good effect getting the Forester out of a tight spot and travelvw wound up using his hand winch to slide the back of his car over to line up. It's a Wyeth Scott and worked great and is clearly much more flexible than using an electric winch. I took slammo's advice and drove back across the stream to an easier place to turn around which seemed easy but I bent a tie rod in the process, first time I've done that. A mile or two later we got to the end of the trail. Near the end of the trail was a campsite along the stream we stayed the night at. M and Z went to work on the tie rod. Across the road from the end of the trail was a campground with outhouses we used in the morning. Had to hit the stream crossing at high speed. First trail of the day immediately took us to a large downed tree. The woods around it was fairly open and we could have just driven around it but slammo wanted to clear the trail. Spent an hour or two with the sawzall and snatch strap pulling that out of the road. Later that day slammo had us on some crazy rocky hill climbs. Travelvw and I each got a flat tire from big sidewall cuts. He bent both front control arms back a bit. There was one long steep rough section of climb that I had to take a few runs at. R had no problems with the low range. This picture was far from the worst of it but we did a lot of miles of this type of rocky climb. We drove through quite a bit of standing water and washed up a bunch of these what I assume were frog eggs. At some point we noticed the Outback's LR trailing arm bracket was loose on the frame. The section of sheet metal that's bolted to had rusted/ripped out and really only the front bolt was holding it on. We stopped along a gravel road and wound up cutting those bolts off and running longer bolts all the way up to the upper section of the body. I told Z to look for some big washers in my bag of fasteners and he jokingly suggested using a wheel spacer. It actually was close enough to the bracket bolt pattern that we were eventually able to get all three bolts all the way through. While we were doing that Travelvw used a strap to a tree to bend his control arms forward a bit so his tires wouldn't rub. The last trail we were on took us to Spainhour falls, a pretty large waterfall you can camp next to. The trail isn't extremely long or difficult but is rocky with a bunch of stream crossings, seemed a lot worse at night than the next morning in the daylight. There were of course people at the campsite so we drove a bit farther down the trail and found an old side road that was blocked off/overgrown to camp at for our privacy and their peace and quiet. The next morning I got the last trailing arm bolt out and put a long one up through the wheel spacer, checked over everything, packed up, and the IL/IN contingent headed out. This was along the trail to Spainhour on the way out.

I think I finally figured out my main hatch opening problem. This is a picture I took of a parts hatch I have showing how the latch and lock works. I'd already taken the power lock actuator out of this one, that is normally in the bracket on the right. The lock works by lifting the slotted mechanism at the bottom. When it is up it is locked and when you pull on the handle for the hatch it just slides past the little L shaped arm at the bottom and the hatch won't open. When it is unlocked the little tab at the lower right pushes on that L arm and opens the hatch. The top of that opening rod where it attaches to the hatch handle is threaded. A while back on my friend's Forester we had to lengthen that a bit since it was not opening fully. So I tried that on mine. Seemed to work for a while but this morning I could not get it open despite a lot of wiggling, pushing, pulling, and cussing. It's hard to see on a good hatch, especially closed, but once I pulled open the interior panel inside the car it looked like the slotted arm at the bottom was too far to the right. That makes it sit on top of that L shaped arm. Then when you try to unlock it, it can't swing down into place. So I shortened the threaded rod and it seems to work fine now, I locked and unlocked it and opened and closed it a bunch of times with no issues. It seems like the root of the problem is that the handle doesn't have a lot of extra throw so that adjustment is very important. Maybe someday I'll make a handle with a longer arm on it. If you're having this problem and your hatch won't open the best thing to do would be to pull the interior panel out and then remove that threaded rod from the handle. Then pull up on the rod, unlock the hatch with key or power lock, and then push down on the rod and open the hatch.

did that chart help at all?

I would skip the 5 speed DR if you're going to run a real tcase, just makes life even harder on the poor 5MT in my experience, but if you already have one and think it will work go for it. I'd go EZ30/36 since you're already swapping in something with different wiring than the chassis. A non dual range 5MT should hold up pretty well with a tcase behind it. Are the toyota axles really that hard to find? Just did a quick search on car-part, looks like $400-600 for an early 80s Toyota front axle and you'd have to travel a few hundred miles. Maybe that's too expensive and too far to go. This might help your D44 front axle length quandary (scroll down to chart): https://www.pirate4x4.com/forum/general-4x4-discussion/449462-info-dana-44-front-axle-shaft-lengths-all-spicer-1967-02-a.html

After all that engine work you should really get it on a dyno sometime to fine tune the jetting and timing. Might as well get it running as best you can by feel first. If it's just a matter of not being able to post it on the forum, I'd put it on youtube. Then you only have to upload it once and can share it anywhere. If it's too big to upload in general you can edit it shorter and/or reduce the resolution.

Got the windshield in the 99 Outback replaced over the weekend. It was very cracked by the end of last year. While it was out I welded up most of the cracks in the cowl and hammered/ground down the high spots that looked like they were hitting the windshield. Hopefully it will last a while without cracking but I doubt it. I've wanted to upgrade the lighting on my Outbacks for a while. There are so many options now, the best modern solution seems to be projectors and I'd read that The Retrofit Source is the best place to get them. They sell 70mm LED projectors for $80 per pair so I figured I'd try to fit a pair in each stock headlight housing. I have some extras so if this didn't work out I could just go back to stock. The first one took me a long time. I may have spent an hour or two prying it apart. By the time I was done it looked like a racoon had chewed it open. Before I did the second one I read online that you just put it in an oven at 200-250F for twenty minutes and it pulls right apart. Here is the first one cut to fit two projectors. Not pretty but no one will really see it behind the plastic cover. The one on the right in this picture doesn't stick far enough out the back to hold it on with a nut so I cut some slots in the bottom of the housing and used a hose clamp. The pictures below are with HID bulbs in the stock location on both sides for high and low. On the passenger side are the two projectors. On the driver's side is a KC 2"x4" spot with an HID bulb. Here are just the low beams. The pattern without the plastic cover is pretty crazy. Ignore the aiming, I did that later. High beams, cover on left, no cover on right. You can see the cover really spreads out the light. We did polish the covers we put on in the end and that reduced the spread some. Projectors on the right with no cover. You can see the pattern is pretty tight. Now with the cover on the right (pre polishing). Clearly far more light output than the two HIDs on the left. Now some pictures with two projectors in each housing and HIDs for the stock high/low beams. Old KC is unplugged (used the plug for projectors). Pictures are blurry but you can get the idea. Notice the utility pole and trees you can barely see in the first pictures show up with the projectors. Also you can see much farther down the road. Low beams High beams - hard to tell from these pictures but the high beams do aim up a bit and shine farther down the road. High beams with projectors. Also even with all these lights on, the AC, and the defroster, voltage was steady at 14V. Still planning on getting a pair of 10 or 12" light bars to fit under the headlights on the 2002 white Outback. If I like those I'll probably put a pair on the 99 too, can't have too much light for desert racing.

Looks great! Did you fire it up? How do you get the engine and fuel cell in? Slide in fuel cell and then engine from the side and then put on the carb, etc? Are the rear CV axles at a huge angle? You should weigh it when it's all assembled and running.

yes We did make them all the same amount longer. I see what you mean now about having the ones farther from the trailing arm pivot longer than the ones closer to the pivot. Thanks for bringing that up, hadn't thought about it. It's not that extreme though, the fowardmost link is about 70% of the way back, the middle one is about 80% of the way back. So even if you made them all an inch longer you're only talking a quarter inch or so error, the bushings flex that much. These links are not much longer than stock, just enough that we can get more droop before we bottom out the inner CVs but the axles don't pull out of the diff at ride height. At the moment it doesn't seem to matter with all the flex in the various bushings but I'll probably experiment with at least making the link closest to the trailing arm pivot shorter when I start on the longer shocks. Will probably just pull one bolt out of that one and cycle it and see if it should be longer or shorter. Fabbed up, painted, assembled, and installed another set on the driver's side last week but haven't really driven the car since then. I'm a little temped to just remove that forwardmost lateral link, it really shouldn't be needed except as others have pointed out the trailing arm bushing is super soft and it would be the only thing controlling toe.

About 2" IIRC. Now I can mock up a longer shock and different shock mount and figure out exactly.

Built some slightly longer lateral links for the 2002 Outback. This will allow more droop before we bottom out the inner CVs. These are the mockup links we made to determine length. One end of each was welded to a bolt that threaded into a nut that was welded in the tube. That let us change the lengths and allowed the ends to pivot since we didn't have bushings or ball joints. Also shows the various link ends. This is one set of links tack welded in the jig. One set of links fully welded. Had to bend the tube for the upper link to clear the bump stop part of the frame. Could have notched the frame but wanted to make this as bolt on as possible. Bushings pressed in. The outer bushing for the upper link is offset so I cut it off and made a spacer. This will allow me to eventually make a spare that will fit either side. Used that same bushing cut down for the front lower lateral link since you can't buy those bushings separate. Compared to stock links. Installed. Had to use a longer bolt for that long link since I made the little bushings on the end so the holes don't get wallered out. Had to put a big point on that bolt to get it started. Then had to pry down on the suspension to bolt the shock back in. Not sure how that's going to go with a longer shock with more droop. I've driven this a little and the axle doesn't pull out of the diff so I think it's good. Made another set for the other side and painted them, just have to press in bushings and put them on the car. I have the shafts and bodies I need now to make the shocks longer. Might be a while before I get to that. Need to make new upper shock mounts and put big holes in the floor to run the shocks through. While they're apart I want to change the valving too.

One of our friends got a 2004 Forester XT recently. We built strut spacers and oil pan and gas tank protection for it. Same as we've done the last few times, I don't think I took any pictures. Will be interesting to see how it works on the trail. One thing it has that we've never seen before is bracing under the front control arms. Looks like it would be a little harder to work on the suspension and might limit lift or travel but that could be fixed. My 99 Outback could really use something like that. If my windshield keeps cracking maybe I'll build something like it.

I have considered a turbo, an STI would really be ideal with the stronger drivetrain. The biggest downside is they're still expensive. Also you can't fit 15" wheels over their giant brakes and I'm not sure our long travel struts would bolt up. They're almost all sedans too. I've thought about a WRX, that might be the best bang for the buck. The low end torque is still terrible though, that's where the EZ36 with variable valve timing would be great, even better supercharged. At that point you'd probably need a 6MT and R180 even in a light car though. Aside from being light but still having decent cargo capacity, I like the first gen Impreza since it has manual climate controls, seats, etc. Fewer things to go wrong even though that stuff holds up better on a Subaru than most other cars. Yes, the white Outback has a 4EAT and EZ30. I think if you're just nicking your rockers occasionally you're probably sitting about right. The more you lift it the worse the cornering will get, you'll start to lose weight on the front end in hill climbs, and just put more stress on everything.

I can just unbolt that plate if I need to use the tow points or winch mount. Since it's an automatic it really shouldn't be flat towed. We've only had to flat tow a car three times I can think of in the five years we've been doing this so it's pretty rare. Most likely if we're going somewhere on the highway this would be towing a lighter car like my Impreza. Winch has also been used rarely, maybe a half dozen times, and a few of those times we should have just used a snatch strap instead. Haven't tested the lift points yet, need to make a 1.25" square post for my high lift and test that out, probably this week. I thought about removing the air box like I did on my Impreza. That seems to be working but I figure the more intake length and twists and turns are in the system the less likely I'll get water in the engine.

I used to do that with my 99 but it doesn't stick out far enough from the lights and fenders to really protect them. I drive in town and trial ride them both and my Impreza. Didn't do any races last year, would like to at least do one in Texas this year. The 99 is much more fun and consistent to drive with the 5MT and steering brake, so it's still my first choice trail riding. It won't last forever though and the cage makes it less comfortable. Keep thinking about what I'd replace the 99 and/or the Impreza with. Leaning towards a first gen Impreza with H6, maybe 3.6 supercharged, long travel struts, and some kind of steering brake. Might be 1000# lighter than the 99 and 50% more power. Main purpose of the bumper is pushing over / rubbing around small trees when necessary. I have a similar plate below the bumper on my 99 and it doesn't make the car run any hotter at highway speeds (tested with gutted thermostat). I have full skidplates on the 99 but at this point I think that would just be extra weight and hassle on this car, trying not to make it super heavy. Even if the airbox gets a hole or crack from a well placed branch, no big deal, just don't want it to be completely smashed. After hitting a stump while blinded by glare one time I've been building these engine skids pretty heavy duty. Like you say it's really handy in the woods to be able to just pull up or back up to a tree without damaging the car. Have done that while winching someone out before too so the car doesn't move. Definitely want to see how your King springs and AGX struts work in Arkansas.

Built a front bumper for my 2002 Outback. 4" square I used on my 99 seems overkill and blocks a lot of the radiator. Went with 2" x 4" tubing for the main beam of this one. The one on my 99 is a little lacking in protection for the fenders and lights since I built it to fit under the plastic bumper cover. I'm not planning on putting the plastic back on this one so I used 2" x 4" by the lights and made it stick out a little wider. Wanted to make the main beam out of one piece of tubing for strength and appearance so I got a little creative on this end clearing the airbox. Used CAD (cardboard aided design) for the layout. Blocked up the beam to get it level with the headlights. Left about 4" between the lights and beam to allow room for a short light bar on each side Also exposes a lot more radiator to direct airflow than my 99. Built some mounting plates. I had to knock out the mounting studs to get the bumper on and off with some other tubes I added later. That was a real pain. Passenger side of beam closed up and tack welded. Bottom of the beam showing lift, towing, and winch points. By my calculations those receivers on the sides should easily be able to support the weight of the car. Tubes to allow sliding over obstacles, support a steel sheet, and brace the radiator support. Diagonal tube will hopefully keep branches and saplings from hooking on the end of the bumper and wrecking the fender when backing up in the woods. Built some tubes on the other side for the same reason and to protect the airbox. Slotted the top mounts to allow the bumper/supports to get pushed back. This is how it looks painted and installed. Blockoff sheet didn't hurt cooling on my 99 and keeps the radiator much cleaner. Would have to remove it for winching or towing, not cutting any holes in it for now. Tried to build it to stick out about 2" from the fenders and lights.