Hooke road bumpers

Tried asking this over on Facebook. But honestly I really hate that place. Too many keyboard Warriors with zero experience.

Anyway, wondering if anyone here has actual real-world experience with the Hook Road bumpers? I know you supposedly get what you pay for. But I can't tell you how many ARB bumpers I have seen completely mangled from Fairly minor Collision. I can't really afford to buy a $1000+ front & rear bumper... a few people on FB said they were flimsy and bent easily. To that I asked can you show me pictures? Nobody could. They all said oh I just took it off and threw it in the trash where it belongs. Honestly I cannot imagine it being that bad, I mean truthfully there's nothing more than a piece of plastic on the front of the truck now. And the back bumper is not much better. If you push on it hard you can actually see it Flex.

https://www.hookeroad.com/products/...2&_sid=8ad945662&_ss=r&variant=40385455358132

https://www.hookeroad.com/products/...MI26WsgO2I8AIVNQnnCh03UgLcEAQYCCABEgKJ4vD_BwE


Well anyway enough rambling on, if anyone has any real-world experience with these bumpers please let me know how it has held up, how it fit and that sort of thing.

Thanks in advance.

 

No experience here but I would like to see pics of arb bumpers that were mangled from minor collisions. If an arb bumper gets mangled in a minor crash, I would think a Hooke Road bumper would be wrapped around my testicles in a similar crash. IMO, Hooke Road bumpers are an upgrade from the OEM but I have my doubts of it's strength in a true offroad recovery situation. Worth a buy if you need an OEM upgrade within a certain budget.
https://www.tacomaworld.com/threads/hooke-road-rear-bumper.601253/

 

I don't do any major off-roading, I just want something a little bit better than the factory plastic bumper. My truck is never been in a wreck but the old lady I bought it from pulled up a little too close to a brick building and bumped the bumper pushing in the plastic slightly. Ever since that happened of course all the clips broke and the goddamn thing rattles. I replaced all the clips that I can get to but it doesn't really matter it's still rattles. Not sure if it's just the fog lights or what. Either way I would like to have something a little bit stronger.
I come from a 1989 Toyota 4Runner. Everyone in that world swore up and down that the Smittybilt bumper were absolute garbage. I can tell you from personal experience at 55 miles an hour in a collision it held up 1000x better then the factory would have. And probably 100 times better than the cheap 1 in diameter Trail garbage that everyone else like to run. They offer no protection in the real world. Yeah if you're going a few miles an hour and you bump into a small 3 inch tree, or back into a small Boulder at extremely slow speeds they do offer more protection in the factory bumper. Hell after just a little bit of massaging I was able to use the same Smittybilt bumper again after repairing the other damage. So if this Hook Road is anything like that, I'd be absolutely % fine with that.

 

I have the HR rear bumper. No complains here. I've bottomed it out going up steep inclines with no damage.

 

Any fitment issues or anything like that? I think I saw somebody else saying that you have to have a factory receiver to use the bumper. I don't have a factory receiver. Have an aftermarket I suppose I could make some new mounting plates or something.

 

There are several threads here about several different mass market steel bumper don’t bolt up without a stock hitch receiver. There is an extra bracket that adds a few bolt holes on each side. For looks you would be fine but I would have concerns about using a Hooke bumper as a pull point.

 

I mostly just looking for something a little bit stronger than the factory front and rear bumper. The front is extremely flimsy. And I understand that it has to be that way so that the airbag junk works. Yeah you can tell I'm not a believer in airbags. I've seen my fair share of people severely injured by them. Not to mention the fact that if they go off for any reason whatsoever, the insurance company totals your vehicle.

So are you saying without the factory receiver hitch you cannot use most mass produced aftermarket bumpers? Not sure if I'm understanding you correctly.

 

I have a factory hitch and it bolted right on. Not sure about aftermarket hitches though. Idk that I would want to use it as a snatch point but I'm using a pintle hook on the hitch receiver for that. It's much sturdier that the factory bumper. I believe it weighs 19lbs more than the factory bumper so you're not adding too much weight.

 

https://www.tacomaworld.com/threads...r-model-with-aftermarket-towing-hitch.654961/

 

I just installed Hooke Road's HR rear bumper on my 2018 TRD Sport. I wanted something that had side steps (I'm amazed Toyota didn't include those OEM like almost every other pick up design has), didn't require cutting of the truck, and worked with the stock hitch. After searching and trying to gather as much info as I could, I saw this company and they seemed like they weren't total Chinese trash, but it's clear they're no heavy duty custom made product either. I was surprised at the quality of the metal, welds, and powder coating. It arrived in a very securely packed box, all hardware along with it. Instructions were about useless, but the toughest part is getting the over designed stock bumper off (a world class engineering clusterF**K on Toyota's part). The Hooke Road bumper slid right on, holes lined up with very little force needed. It looks damn nice I think, I'm reasonably happy with it, but here are the concerns I have for future potential buyers or anyone who cares since they don't tell you any of this and it's helpful to know...if youre truck like mine doesn't have the back up sensors, the four holes in the new bumper will look like what you see in my pictures...horses**t....they don't include plugs of any type, for $500 you'd think they would include four plastic pop ins just in case. The trailer plug installed vertically on this instead of horizontally like the stock, the wiring trunk that plugs in from behind needs to be stretched and the zip tie downs along the driver's side frame need to be removed to allow the wiring trunk to shift. It can be done but it's at it's length without adding wiring to it, if the cut out was shifted to the left maybe an inch, it wouldn't be an issue. The license plate light cut outs are alright but the plastic light housings shift around, there's no grommet of any type, so you'll have to use some clear silicone and pressure to secure them if you care to do so. The side steps, while a wonderful addition and certainly better than nothing, must have been sized for some chinaman's feet because any man with feet bigger than size 10, let alone wearing boots, will be lucky to get the tip of his toes into the cut out. I haven't hooked the lights up yet, but I imagine they're the cheapest versions you can find, so I wouldn't put much stock in them lasting. The powder coating is decent enough, but if you live anywhere where there's salt and sand, I guarantee you'll start seeing flaking and surface rust within a year or so. Not as bad as Smittybilt's communist trash, but again....it's easy enough at that point to remove, strip, and spray with Raptor liner or something similar once and for all. I only wish Ranch Hand made a matching rear bumper, I swear by their front's. Can't wait to get mine up on the truck. Hope this info helps anyone who's looking at Hooke Road's products in the future. I'd give them 3.5 out of 5. It's a step up from stock for sure.