hey if you start one and feel like making a 2nd gen bumper let me know! Alot of these companys are getting insane. Buckstop's used to be 800 or so. now there 1800. Everyone else seems to be on the same page.

 

Please try to remember that most of the price increases we have seen in many of our manufactured products is the price of steel.

My company has seen a 25% raw material increase just this year.

 

Not to defend just T.R, but most company's..

I had a business making bumpers, steps, rock rails, etc..

Yes Steel is costly.. but when you have a business and you rent/own a shop.. have employees, medical, insurance, etc the overhead is very high.. so yes when I made a custom bumper for a customer I may have only had $400 or 500 in steel but you forget I had 30 hrs or more in labor in it, my electric bill, my welder supplies, grinding wheels, plasma cutter, etc.. if you do not charge for everything that you use to build it then you will go bankrupt..

Yes the more I built the quicker I paid off the supplies I used.. but for every item built there is still an overhead that you have to recop first before you even get it profit..

I used to even use Laser CNC machines which was costly but reduced my Labor time.. but it always adds back up.

I recommend if you do not want to give $2200 to a bumper company then go buy yourself a welder, go take a welding course at a community college and build yourself one... then with the skills you learned you can build other things for yourself.

 

Amen, why pay the labor fee when you can invest that money in tools and do it your self!

 

with all this talk of bumpers, anyone boxing or reinforcing the front of the frame like older fords? im building a bumper and before i hang it i'm going to box the front section. No point in having a big peice of iron hanging on your rig if all its going to do is transfer energy right into our not so stout frame. Better to design the bumper to bend a little, which is an easy fix with a rosebud and 8 pound beeter, than a frame staighting shop.

 

500$ front and back build your own dude

 

We have probably the biggest new steel store in the Southeast, right over in the next county.

I recently bought enough material for two complete HEAVY bumpers, grille guards, brackets, the works.

Also, picked up a bunch of miscellaneous odds and ends of steel, just to have around.

Total bill was less than forty bucks.

I regularly see plates from as far as Georgia, the Carolinas, etc. there simply to buy steel.

Us locals have always sort of taken it for granted.

 

How bout some more details of this Mecca? Like name and county?