1/8 good to use.

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Snake

Snake

Mopar Nut
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IS 1/8 STEEL good to use for the brackets for the rear bumper,in the pic is my Left side temp plate.Whatsssssssss your thoughts.

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Don, I think 1/8 should be just fine as that is over 100 thousands and somewhat heavier than the frame rails they connect to.
 
So long as you wont be using a bumper jack.
The frame rail is tubular which makes it a lot stronger than the plate its formed with.
 
The 70-73 Duster rear brackets are about .3" thick, which is what I measured on my car. Probably 9/32" plus paint. Not sure about the Duster front brackets, but for a 70-72 dart the front brackets are stamped sheet metal. It's 9 or 10 gauge, I measured mine at ~.14" thick. So probably 10 gauge plus paint. That's a single half of the bracket, they'd be double that where they overlap at the frame. Funny enough doubling them up would make about the same thickness as in the back, might be something to that.

As far as using the 1/8", it will hold the bumper on, but you won't be able to use a bumper jack (not that you'd probably want to anyway) and they'd be pretty much cosmetic. They wouldn't do anything other than flatten out in an accident. The frame rails are fairly thin, but there are 2-3 layers of overlapped metal where the brackets attach. Minimum of 2, because at the very least you have the rear cross support and the tabs on the frame rail. And then there's the fact that that rails are basically tubular, and since the brackets span the whole rail and then some the surface area covered becomes a big part of the strength, so it's not just about the thickness of the metal.
 
No way. 1/8" is only .125" thick. No way in hell would I use that for bumper brackets.
 
Aint much of anything holding the big plastic nose on newer vehicles, but then that nose serves no purpose. If my 67 fish had huge iron bumpers ( more "tank like" structures ) protecting its front and rear trim I would drive it more often.
 
Thanks for the thoughts gents,no way i ever plan on the bumper jack.The brackets have 2 mounts 1 is all ready bolted to the rear valance,the outher is going to be bolted to were the factory shock went.Not worried at all,and yes AL I will never back into any thing.
 
RustyRatRod said:
No way. 1/8" is only .125" thick. No way in hell would I use that for bumper brackets.
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The 2 org brackets that mount bumper,to body ,I am useig now,do you s
DesertRat said:
No, they are twice that at the frame. I just installed the front and they are at least 3/8" thick where they bolt to the bumper, probably thicker and they are heavy!
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Thats what i am useing now,org bumper to body brackets there are 2 holes to mount 70-72 mount at valance,74 only 1 hole to mount,thusssssss i have to make up the last hole hence the bracket i have fabe up to mount to the frame.
 
It appears Tony Stewart approves....

Hell Ive had cars I've driven for years without any bumpers at all
 
Snake said:
The bumper is hung now,here is a pic of the plate i fab up.

View attachment 1715009285
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That's what I should have done when I made my conversion bracket for my '74 to '70-'73 bumper swap. Looks good!

Did you make the brackets that bolt to the bumper as well, or are those stock pieces? Those are the ones I thought you were talking about. The bracket you made there is likely stronger than a '70-'73 mount, as on those cars the bumper just bolts to a couple layers of shetmetal (rear crossmember and frame tab).
 
72bluNblu said:
That's what I should have done when I made my conversion bracket for my '74 to '70-'73 bumper swap. Looks good!

Did you make the brackets that bolt to the bumper as well, or are those stock pieces? Those are the ones I thought you were talking about. The bracket you made there is likely stronger than a '70-'73 mount, as on those cars the bumper just bolts to a couple layers of shetmetal (rear crossmember and frame tab).
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Yes stock pieces for sure,i went with what you said,i must say i am glad i found what you did,wayyyyyyyyyyyyyyy better.Thankssssssssssss.
 
Snake said:
Yes stock pieces for sure,i went with what you said,i must say i am glad i found what you did,wayyyyyyyyyyyyyyy better.Thankssssssssssss.
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Yup, I just made mine out of scrap I had in the garage. But I'm going to weld up the rear panel and add a tab to the frame when I pull the bumper off to add the little cosmetic pieces to hide the bumper gap like the original '70-73 cars had.
 
I've debated making aluminum versions of these for my '72 dart for years, and I'll be tossing the bumper shocks on my valiant.

Can you not just use the bumper brackets from older darts to toss the 5mph crap?
 
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