Trailblazer tail light guards with integrated CB mount

by **v7guy** » Tue Nov 13, 2012 5:58 am

Been working on these off and on for awhile. To be honest the finished night pic makes me want to cut off the damn thing and make the lines follow the tail light curves better. We'll see how much it bugs me. It's good on some angles at least. I get an SWR of 1.1 to 1.8 spanning all the channels after some CB tuning.

Basically it's simple. Heat up rod, bend, file to fit, weld it up and then bedline. You're left with a pile of shit. Think I got about $30 in em.

by **dvanbramer88** » Tue Nov 13, 2012 8:38 am

Defiantly different looking. Looks like wrought iron art. Hell, if anything you can now tell people you had the stones to make them yourself instead of paying way to much for Westins.

by **bartonmd** » Tue Nov 13, 2012 8:56 am

Cool!

by **HARDTRAILZ** » Tue Nov 13, 2012 11:12 am

I think I like it. Was not sure when I read the title, but it is pretty cool.

by **CHIEF BIG RIDGE** » Wed Nov 14, 2012 11:22 am

I am definitely trying my hand at this. Can we get a daylight pic?

by **v7guy** » Wed Nov 14, 2012 2:37 pm

CHIEF BIG RIDGE wrote:I am definitely trying my hand at this. Can we get a daylight pic?

no problem, got a few more views too. not totally happy with em, but they serve the purpose. I may tighten up the top half in the future. The CB is grounded to the body through the guard itself.

by **SaltWaterDrinker** » Wed Nov 14, 2012 5:14 pm

That's pretty sweet looking.!

by **RyansTBLS** » Thu Nov 15, 2012 4:21 pm

I like how the bars sweep down instead of cut through the light, I always wonder ho much light I lose having the bar go through the brightest part. I especially like how the antenna grounds through the guard. :cheers:

by **fishsticks** » Fri Nov 16, 2012 5:53 am

I like how they actually have enough space between them and the light to be functional (ie absorb an impact) vs all the premade crap that sits right next to the light.

by **v7guy** » Tue Nov 20, 2012 10:57 am

fishsticks wrote:I like how they actually have enough space between them and the light to be functional (ie absorb an impact) vs all the premade crap that sits right next to the light.

I was a little surprised when I saw Moots1288 put some bought ones on his envoy and the fender side of the taillight guard rested on the light with a rubber bumper piece.

by **navigator** » Tue Nov 20, 2012 2:23 pm

what Moots put on his is a 3rd mounting point to give it a more solid mount. It is basically an electrical/conduit brace or something similar. I understand with the 2 point mounting they tend to wobble a bit but when you add 1-2 of those braces it makes them more solid.

I've got to pick up a couple of those to get my guards mounted.

by **HARDTRAILZ** » Tue Nov 20, 2012 6:34 pm

navigator wrote:what Moots put on his is a 3rd mounting point to give it a more solid mount. It is basically an electrical/conduit brace or something similar. I understand with the 2 point mounting they tend to wobble a bit but when you add 1-2 of those braces it makes them more solid.

I've got to pick up a couple of those to get my guards mounted.

I did not use anything but the 2 factory mounting points and even had my cb on the taillight guards without issue of wobbling or solidity... But what would I know..I only actually owned and used them for a couple years...........

by **Moots1288** » Tue Nov 20, 2012 8:30 pm

.......

by **boog2006** » Wed Nov 21, 2012 1:37 am

HARDTRAILZ wrote:
navigator wrote:what Moots put on his is a 3rd mounting point to give it a more solid mount. It is basically an electrical/conduit brace or something similar. I understand with the 2 point mounting they tend to wobble a bit but when you add 1-2 of those braces it makes them more solid.

I've got to pick up a couple of those to get my guards mounted.

I did not use anything but the 2 factory mounting points and even had my cb on the taillight guards without issue of wobbling or solidity... But what would I know..I only actually owned and used them for a couple years...........

There's a secret love story here somewhere...

by **v7guy** » Wed Nov 21, 2012 4:46 am

boog2006"
There's a secret love story here somewhere...[/quote]

or something... lol

[quote="navigator wrote:what Moots put on his is a 3rd mounting point to give it a more solid mount. It is basically an electrical/conduit brace or something similar. I understand with the 2 point mounting they tend to wobble a bit but when you add 1-2 of those braces it makes them more solid.

I've got to pick up a couple of those to get my guards mounted.

That's what they are, we found em in the electrical section at Lowes. They seem to work for a lot of guys. My comment was more focused on the idea that the tail light gaurds could be pulled back if they caught on something on the leading edge of the gaurds. Obviously they aren't a requirement since Kyle used em without the additional brace. In the case of the ones I tossed together, the mounts are all sheet metal so it doesn't apply.

by **v7guy** » Mon Sep 30, 2013 3:22 am

So the CB antennae has always had a pretty decent amount of sway to it. I always thought in the past that it was the spring with just a bit of give in the rod of the mount. But as it turns out it was mostly in sheet metal mount.

You'll notice that the CB mount is zip tied, that's because the flex finally work hardened the metal enough that it cracked and started peeling away. I also noticed some rust in the break, which means it was probably starting to break for a long while.

After some consideration, I figured I'd go completely overkill and build a new mount out of 3/16" steel. The top plate was drilled, ground, and welded for the mount and the ground just like the original. But I wanted to do something a bit more fun.
I've been playing with hammer shaping steel for awhile and after this I've established that I need to build a small forge cause I really do enjoy hammer forming metal.

I cut out the mount plate and then I cut out the wrap around shape for the "claw" reinforcement. I wrapped it around the flat mount plate and then tacked it into place with probably a dozen good tacks. Then I burned it in pretty good and started heating up the entire piece to white hot. Then with a ball peen and a few pieces of rod and other chunks of iron I pounded it out to the shape I wanted.

James02 helped a lot with the process, holding this and that and trusting me not to burn him. I couldn't have done this without his help. A ton of thanks goes to him.

At the end I cut off the old mount and welded on the new mount. It barely moves at all and I was really surprised at how much of the flex was because of the sheet metal.

After hammer forming, a quick workover with a bastard file and a flap disk and everything was to my liking. I'm considering doing a dual CB antennae just cause I had so much fun making this.

by **HARDTRAILZ** » Mon Sep 30, 2013 2:03 pm

Look cool, but wouldnt they grab shit that is sliding down the side of truck...like branches?

I may be mistaken, but dual antennas don't help much at all for our use offroad. http://cbradiomagazine.com/May%202007/D ... ything.htm

You could do a integrated flag mount on other one for use at offroad parks and such. Saw a nice idea with using quick connect air chucks for flag mount.

by **Regulator1175** » Mon Sep 30, 2013 2:08 pm

HARDTRAILZ wrote:Look cool, but wouldnt they grab shit that is sliding down the side of truck...like branches?

I may be mistaken, but dual antennas don't help much at all for our use offroad. http://cbradiomagazine.com/May%202007/D ... ything.htm

You could do a integrated flag mount on other one for use at offroad parks and such. Saw a nice idea with using quick connect air chucks for flag mount.

Who did that? :cool:

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by **HARDTRAILZ** » Mon Sep 30, 2013 2:15 pm

Could not remember if you or Scott did first. I know before his bumper, he had it on his stock tire carrier.

by **Regulator1175** » Mon Sep 30, 2013 2:17 pm

HARDTRAILZ wrote:Could not remember if you or Scott did first. I know before his bumper, he had it on his stock tire carrier.

Not real sure, I stole the idea from a random picture online.

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Offroad Trailblazers and Envoys