Unless you haven’t noticed I’m a big fan of Kaymar bumpers, so when Tony told me he wanted a rear bumper there was only one place we were going to look.
Kaymar is an Australian company that is considered to be the leading manufacturer and innovator of rear accessories for 4×4 trucks. All of their products are built in Australia and tested in the Outback under some of the most grueling conditions in the world. So as Hank Hill would say, Kaymar only makes rear bumper, and rear bumper accessories.
We ordered the bumper from Ben Meddows at Outback Proven and had it shipped to Main Line Overland to save some money on the shipping (having a commercial address and loading dock makes a big difference). Tony decided to go with the dual swing out setup which includes a tire carrier on the driver side and a jerry can carrier on the passenger side.
The Install (for you do-it-yourselfers):
First make sure you have all of the tools to complete the job, our kit consisted of:
- 1/2 and 3/8 Impact Socket Set (You can do this without air tools but they sure make life easier)
- Angle Grinder
- Sawzall
- Cutoff Wheel
- Phillips and Flat Head Screwdriver
We started by gathering all of our tools and removing the spare tire and factory mount. Make sure to put the bolts back in their respective holes after you remove the spare tire mount.
After you’ve removed the spare tire and mount you’ll have to start working on removing the factory bumper. There are a few bolts on top that are easily accessible with the trunk door open and a few more under the bumper along the frame. There is also one plastic plug on the passenger side that you’ll need a flat head screw driver to remove, be careful because you’ll need to reuse this plug (For more detailed take down instructions check out any of the FJ Cruiser forums).
Once you have all the hardware removed give the bumper a good tug and the plastic clips will pop loose from the body. It’s going to feel like something is going to break but don’t worry nothing will.
Once the bumper is removed this is what you have. This is also a great time to point out that you’ll be spending a decent amount of time under the truck, so it’s a good idea to thoroughly wash the undercarriage unless you like the taste of dirt or you just hate your friends.
Also at this point you’ll need to remove the factory tow hitch if you have one. You’re going to want either an impact or breaker bar for this one.
Now you’ll want to take a good luck at the instructions Kaymar includes with the bumper, in particular the pictures showing you where cut the factory bumper. Kaymar has you reuse some of the factory trim so make sure to take your time, and always remember your safety glasses.
Once you’ve made the proper cuts to the factory bumper you can go ahead and reattach them to the body.
Next you’re going to have to break out your angle grinder to grind down the welds on the frame so the bumper will fit. You’re going to have to do a few test fits to figure out where you’re going to have to grind, but it’s pretty quick and painless. Make sure to touch up the frame when you’re done with some black paint to prevent rust.
This next step might vary depending on how hard you’ve wheeled your FJ. If you’re a man like Tony, you’ve probably come down on your tailpipe hard numerous times and it looks like a deformed taco shell or frowny face. His was bent up so much it was interfering with the bumper so like any rational person would do we broke out the sawzall. Problem solved.
Now with the help of a jack you can slide the bumper into position and start threading all of the bolts. Just get each one on with a few turns and don’t tighten any of them up until you start the thread on every bolt. Something to consider is that even with everything ground down we still had to ream out a few of the bolt holes in the bumper. This may vary, but it’s something to keep in mind.
Once you have everything bolted up you can go ahead and grease the spindles for the tire and jerry can carrier.
Once everything is greased up you can attach the tire and jerry can carrier. Once you have them attached you can bolt on the latches and get to the wiring.
The wiring is pretty straight forward as long as you have a factory trailer wiring harness, just tap into the respective wires and you’re all done. If you don’t have a factory trailer wiring harness then you can just run your wires up into the taillights. In regards to the license plate light, Kaymar provides you with extra wiring so you can run it into the passenger side taillight.
Here are some closeups of the bumper deployed, and the retention system for keeping the swing arms locked open.
Because the bumpers are drilled for Australian license plates they don’t fit US spec plates, so we ended up just using double sided tape and a zip tie for extra security because race car.
Total install time for this bumper was 5 hours, but this doesn’t include an unscheduled visit to Advanced Auto and drinking beer. If we were going to do it again it would probably only take about 3 hours, not including the wiring. So far Tony has been really happy with the Kaymar and is comforted that he doesn’t have to worry about destroying his factory plastic bumper anymore. Keep an eye out for the long term review in a few months.
We have to give a big thank you to Ben at Outback Proven for the excellent service and the quick delivery time. And as always our gratitude goes out to Matt and Pete with Main Line Overland for their continued support and use of their loading dock.
Nice! Ben is pretty awesome!