Pickup Accessories

[nokia]

Installed any new accessories on your pickup? Did you get a good price for it?

i was quoted a price of 2500b for a decent looking front bar, 1500b for a not-so-good looking one.

Any comparison out there?

[jbowman1993]

Many people who've given an opinion about those front bars on this forum are against them. Reasons cited were 1) they greatly decrease the the safety of the vehicle in front end collisions, since they interfere with the built in crumple zones. 2) They are much more dangerous for people outside the vehicle, who might get in the way of those giant steel bars. 3) They cut down on the aerodynamics of th vehicle, increasing fuel consumption.

The recommendation many had was to install the plastic ones specially designed by the manufacturer. There is another thread running where people are talking about accessories. "Vigo plastic bug deflector"

FYI

Many people who've given an opinion about those front bars on this forum are against them. Reasons cited were 1) they greatly decrease the the safety of the vehicle in front end collisions, since they interfere with the built in crumple zones. 2) They are much more dangerous for people outside the vehicle, who might get in the way of those giant steel bars. 3) They cut down on the aerodynamics of th vehicle, increasing fuel consumption.

The recommendation many had was to install the plastic ones specially designed by the manufacturer. There is another thread running where people are talking about accessories. "Vigo plastic bug deflector"

FYI

[griser]

I wouldn't listen to anyone knocking the idea of a front bar, The main purpose of those bars is to keep your truck from getting scraped by passing motor bikes and to keep front end damage down on very low speed collisions, I.E. bumping something with your trucks front end.

I for one am FOR them, they DO keep that damage down.

As far as other accessories you can get them down at the chinatown area pretty cheap. lots of sellers there so you can bargain ;-)

Greg

Edited January 20, 2006 by griser

[nokia]

Actually, i was curious about the price quotations, but it's interesting to hear the arguments for & against installing front bars. Both griser & jbowman1993 have their points. I wonder why many members who drive pickups on this forum INSTALL, and how many DID NOT INSTALL the front bar.

It will be interesting though.

[rcalsop]

Installed any new accessories on your pickup? Did you get a good price for it?

i was quoted a price of 2500b for a decent looking front bar, 1500b for a not-so-good looking one.

Any comparison out there?

Pick up accesories ..!!!!!!!

A full wallet

Clean shaven

Smell of good after shave

A full wallet

A smile

A full wallet

Gold medallion and open neck shirt

A full wallet

Two or three words of Thai

A full wallet

A full head of hair ( not essencial with a full wallet )

A full Wallet

A waistline less than your IQ( not essencial with a full wallet )

A full wallet

An age less than her father( not essencial with a full wallet )

A full wallet .

With these accessories the pick up is completed ....one on each arm ...Now you are motoring !!!!.

Seriously do shop around the price and quality of after market accessories can vary a lot do some research I have found 30% to 40% price differences the suburbs have cheaper prices than the centre of BKK .. the best area I have found is toward Rangsit and Lam Luka . Go past the airport not on the tollway and near to Macro / after Carrefour is a multitude of shops a pick up heaven !!!!

I have used this area many times remember prices include fitting .

[Paragon]

Seriously do shop around the price and quality of after market accessories can vary a lot do some research I have found 30% to 40% price differences the suburbs have cheaper prices than the centre of BKK .. the best area I have found is toward Rangsit and Lam Luka . Go past the airport not on the tollway and near to Macro / after Carrefour is a multitude of shops a pick up heaven !!!!

I have used this area many times remember prices include fitting .

As mentioned in my other post, I found the shop "New Fiber 4x4 ProShop" (recommended to me by Expat Motors) at 02 748 9183 or 748 8877 on the South-West corner of the major intersection between Seacon Square and Bangna-Trad on Srinakarin road gave me good quality stuff for exactly 50% of the price of other shops (grill 3k vs. 6k, full paint job 25k vs. 50k, wheels 100k vs. 200k, etc.)

Jeremy

[Bung]

Installed any new accessories on your pickup? Did you get a good price for it?

i was quoted a price of 2500b for a decent looking front bar, 1500b for a not-so-good looking one.

Any comparison out there?

Pick up accesories ..!!!!!!!

A full wallet

Clean shaven

Smell of good after shave

A full wallet

A smile

A full wallet

Gold medallion and open neck shirt

A full wallet

Two or three words of Thai

A full wallet

A full head of hair ( not essencial with a full wallet )

A full Wallet

A waistline less than your IQ( not essencial with a full wallet )

A full wallet

An age less than her father( not essencial with a full wallet )

A full wallet .

With these accessories the pick up is completed ....one on each arm ...Now you are motoring !!!!.

Seriously do shop around the price and quality of after market accessories can vary a lot do some research I have found 30% to 40% price differences the suburbs have cheaper prices than the centre of BKK .. the best area I have found is toward Rangsit and Lam Luka . Go past the airport not on the tollway and near to Macro / after Carrefour is a multitude of shops a pick up heaven !!!!

I have used this area many times remember prices include fitting .

Is that area past the airport going into or out of town? The airport area is on place I do knoe in BKK

I'm not a big fan of front bars, mainly the look but they come in handy for the motorcy's that like to park inches away from you fore and aft, trapping you in.

[jbowman1993]

I wouldn't listen to anyone knocking the idea of a front bar, The main purpose of those bars is to keep your truck from getting scraped by passing motor bikes and to keep front end damage down on very low speed collisions, I.E. bumping something with your trucks front end.

I for one am FOR them, they DO keep that damage down.

As far as other accessories you can get them down at the chinatown area pretty cheap. lots of sellers there so you can bargain ;-)

Greg

I suppose they might have some advantages. It will keep that front bumper scratch free, so that you can go into your head on collision with the drunken bus driver with a pristine bumper. Then the front end bars force the engine to be pushed into the passenger compartment, along with some of the aforementioned front bumper.

Makes sense, In a weird twisted warped kinda way.

Edited January 22, 2006 by jbowman1993

[griser]

I suppose they might have some advantages. It will keep that front bumper scratch free, so that you can go into your head on collision with the drunken bus driver with a pristine bumper. Then the front end bars force the engine to be pushed into the passenger compartment, along with some of the aforementioned front bumper.

Makes sense, In a weird twisted warped kinda way.

I won't get involved in a pissing contest here, but I'm a mechanical engineer and I can tell you from an engineering standpoint that the front bars produced in thailand aren't strong enough to cause the deformations your talking about.

Most of the ones I've seen here are so weak they would quickly detach on a mid speed collision. Now the ones produced by the manufacturers WOULD cause this because they are properly fitted and of the correct design for PUSHING. Most of the ones produced in Thailand are strickly ornemental and would NOT seriously disrupt the "crumple zone" design of the truck manufacturers.

What they are good for are 1. Looks, 2. keeping the bikes off your bumper and low speed collision protection.

greg

Greg

[rcalsop]

Installed any new accessories on your pickup? Did you get a good price for it?

i was quoted a price of 2500b for a decent looking front bar, 1500b for a not-so-good looking one.

Any comparison out there?

Pick up accesories ..!!!!!!!

A full wallet

Clean shaven

Smell of good after shave

A full wallet

A smile

A full wallet

Gold medallion and open neck shirt

A full wallet

Two or three words of Thai

A full wallet

A full head of hair ( not essencial with a full wallet )

A full Wallet

A waistline less than your IQ( not essencial with a full wallet )

A full wallet

An age less than her father( not essencial with a full wallet )

A full wallet .

With these accessories the pick up is completed ....one on each arm ...Now you are motoring !!!!.

Seriously do shop around the price and quality of after market accessories can vary a lot do some research I have found 30% to 40% price differences the suburbs have cheaper prices than the centre of BKK .. the best area I have found is toward Rangsit and Lam Luka . Go past the airport not on the tollway and near to Macro / after Carrefour is a multitude of shops a pick up heaven !!!!

I have used this area many times remember prices include fitting .

Is that area past the airport going into or out of town? The airport area is on place I do knoe in BKK

I'm not a big fan of front bars, mainly the look but they come in handy for the motorcy's that like to park inches away from you fore and aft, trapping you in.

As stataed towards Rangsit from the airport ...ie away from town ...Travelling North , Macro and Carrefour on your left , the airport on your right .

[nokia]

paragon, although my mooban is up north in chiang mai, it's good to get a price indication from bkk. Bung, you are right, sometimes, motorbikes or cars would park so close in front/behind, that you will have difficulty driving out, or cars parked so close side by side in a Tesco carpark that i cant even open the front door more than 30-40' angle, and have to squeeze myself to get into the truck.

i'm just a potential buyer and my idea of a front grill is to protect from tree branch scratches - less from motorbikes, as i enjoy driving off routes 4WD.

ok, i'm no engineer, but there is no doubt that a grill is good for low speed impacts. As for higher speed impacts, will the connecting bars below break or bend since there are no connecting bars above like a cage? The Euro crash tests use cement walls as frontal impact. Assuming the grill acts like a exterior cement wall upon impact against a non-mobile object eg tree, will it be harder than an actual cement wall?

If the crumple zones are supposed to be effective against a cement wall, (for 5 star rating vehicles), wouldnt it be also effective against crashing into a steel cage/gate of a house? Perhaps pictures of wrecked vehicles may provide some indication, until the Euro crash dummies decide to test vehicles mounted with grills...

[jbowman1993]

Im certainly not a mechanical engineer, but I am trying to wrap my brain around how the bars would fall off during a front end collision. Wouldn't they be pinned in between the two objects be it vehicle vs vehicle or vehicle vs. solid object? Perhaps after the accident, when you are towing it, it might fall off, causing several more accidents in the process (this is Thailand, after all) .

[moonoi]

Im certainly not a mechanical engineer, but I am trying to wrap my brain around how the bars would fall off during a front end collision. Wouldn't they be pinned in between the two objects be it vehicle vs vehicle or vehicle vs. solid object? Perhaps after the accident, when you are towing it, it might fall off, causing several more accidents in the process (this is Thailand, after all) .

I'm with you on this one.

I fail to see how having an additional lump of metal.....no matter how strong or weak.......does not inhibit the effectiveness of the crumple zones

I can understand nokia wanting them for offroading though if these ones available in thailand are so bad, have to wonder about there effectiveness even for keeping tree branches away from you paintwork (or motorcycles).

Edited January 23, 2006 by moonoi

[rcalsop]

Im certainly not a mechanical engineer, but I am trying to wrap my brain around how the bars would fall off during a front end collision. Wouldn't they be pinned in between the two objects be it vehicle vs vehicle or vehicle vs. solid object? Perhaps after the accident, when you are towing it, it might fall off, causing several more accidents in the process (this is Thailand, after all) .

I'm with you on this one.

I fail to see how having an additional lump of metal.....no matter how strong or weak.......does not inhibit the effectiveness of the crumple zones

I can understand nokia wanting them for offroading though if these ones available in thailand are so bad, have to wonder about there effectiveness even for keeping tree branches away from you paintwork (or motorcycles).

I ran a 110 Landrover for many years and toured the Northern Sahara and lots of real off road in Morocco the Landie was equipped with front and back (Bull or Roo ) bars each with a towing hitch . Pushing a caravan into place or pulling from the front to extracate stuck vehicles and caravans is very useful .I loved them

But the best use was to MOVE idiots who trapped me in parking spots with no space to get out ...drop the vehicle into low gear /diff lock and push, then reverse ...to share the damage to both offending cars ...My Landrover suffered no damage ever even though over the years I was challenged by a donkey , goats and a mad camel I always won .

However interms of pedestrian safety I always worried the damage it would do to a child on a bike or an old lady crossing the road . The impact zone was pretty horrific .. at least now my Jazz and my Wish both are engineered to give good pedestrian impact safety and get excellent testing scores the Jazz being one of the best in Europen tests . This is likely to be an area of increasing concern and bull bars fitted as after market items are not engineered with this in mind . They still look good and every day I wish I had my Landrover with the bars to teach a few buses / taxis in BKK a few lessons but this is best kept as a fantasy .

The other main advantage was the bars and the specialised roof rack each had 4 huge Lights on Rally Giants ...with special circuitry to prevent burn outs when they were full on it was like daylight

they provided great warning to other drivers trying to do stupid things excellent in defensive driving

Edited January 23, 2006 by rcalsop

[griser]

Im certainly not a mechanical engineer, but I am trying to wrap my brain around how the bars would fall off during a front end collision. Wouldn't they be pinned in between the two objects be it vehicle vs vehicle or vehicle vs. solid object? Perhaps after the accident, when you are towing it, it might fall off, causing several more accidents in the process (this is Thailand, after all) .

I'm with you on this one.

I fail to see how having an additional lump of metal.....no matter how strong or weak.......does not inhibit the effectiveness of the crumple zones

The point is the bars do NOT connect effectively to the frame. They would snap OFF in a mid speed or higher collision. They only way they could affect the integrity of the "crumple zone" is by being part of the frame of the car. An additional loose piece of metal in the collision would have little effect on the outcome, It would be just as if the grill was part of the object that was struck.

If you won't take my word ask another mech engy.

guys, just dont buy a factory model and you'll be fine, lol

Greg

[Bung]

I wouldn't listen to anyone knocking the idea of a front bar, The main purpose of those bars is to keep your truck from getting scraped by passing motor bikes and to keep front end damage down on very low speed collisions, I.E. bumping something with your trucks front end.

I for one am FOR them, they DO keep that damage down.

As far as other accessories you can get them down at the chinatown area pretty cheap. lots of sellers there so you can bargain ;-)

Greg

I suppose they might have some advantages. It will keep that front bumper scratch free, so that you can go into your head on collision with the drunken bus driver with a pristine bumper. Then the front end bars force the engine to be pushed into the passenger compartment, along with some of the aforementioned front bumper.

Makes sense, In a weird twisted warped kinda way.

Man,

You are really in fantasy land here.

How would having a front bar cause the engine to get pushed back into the passenger compartment?

If you care have a look behind the plastic bumper you will see a....big steel bar!

It is impossible to be able to judge how a car will react in a real world accident, there are too many variables. That is why you will hear of some people having a "miraculous escape" and walking away from a wreck and others not being so lucky.

[moonoi]

I wouldn't listen to anyone knocking the idea of a front bar, The main purpose of those bars is to keep your truck from getting scraped by passing motor bikes and to keep front end damage down on very low speed collisions, I.E. bumping something with your trucks front end.

I for one am FOR them, they DO keep that damage down.

As far as other accessories you can get them down at the chinatown area pretty cheap. lots of sellers there so you can bargain ;-)

Greg

I suppose they might have some advantages. It will keep that front bumper scratch free, so that you can go into your head on collision with the drunken bus driver with a pristine bumper. Then the front end bars force the engine to be pushed into the passenger compartment, along with some of the aforementioned front bumper.

Makes sense, In a weird twisted warped kinda way.

Man,

You are really in fantasy land here.

How would having a front bar cause the engine to get pushed back into the passenger compartment?

If you care have a look behind the plastic bumper you will see a....big steel bar!

It is impossible to be able to judge how a car will react in a real world accident, there are too many variables. That is why you will hear of some people having a "miraculous escape" and walking away from a wreck and others not being so lucky.

Bung

I know what he is talking about.......not in fantasy land at all.......a few years back in the US/UK there was lots of talk about just this as the non manufacturer approved bars mounted onto engine mounting points and not chassis frame which in the event of an accident it pushed the engine into the passenger compartment. I believe that these are banned now........can't remember how long ago it was though.

To griser

I understand your point, but can you understand the problem I just described. Can you be sure that all bars made here in thailand mount to points on chassis where it wouldn't bypass the crumple zones etc.

We're just having a discussion so no need to be so touchy about it!!!!

Edited January 24, 2006 by moonoi

[chanchao]

> Most of the ones produced in Thailand are strickly ornemental

Or just mental.

My second hand car came 'pre-pimped' but when the silly dish rack finally falls off I will not boher to have it attached again. (Already some steel bits used to attach the thing and (ineffectively trying to) keep it from wobbling rusted and fell off. Asked a mechanic and he said those thin bits didn't do much anyway so don't bother welding them on again.

Cheers,

Chanchao

[Bung]

I wouldn't listen to anyone knocking the idea of a front bar, The main purpose of those bars is to keep your truck from getting scraped by passing motor bikes and to keep front end damage down on very low speed collisions, I.E. bumping something with your trucks front end.

I for one am FOR them, they DO keep that damage down.

As far as other accessories you can get them down at the chinatown area pretty cheap. lots of sellers there so you can bargain ;-)

Greg

I suppose they might have some advantages. It will keep that front bumper scratch free, so that you can go into your head on collision with the drunken bus driver with a pristine bumper. Then the front end bars force the engine to be pushed into the passenger compartment, along with some of the aforementioned front bumper.

Makes sense, In a weird twisted warped kinda way.

Man,

You are really in fantasy land here.

How would having a front bar cause the engine to get pushed back into the passenger compartment?

If you care have a look behind the plastic bumper you will see a....big steel bar!

It is impossible to be able to judge how a car will react in a real world accident, there are too many variables. That is why you will hear of some people having a "miraculous escape" and walking away from a wreck and others not being so lucky.

Bung

I know what he is talking about.......not in fantasy land at all.......a few years back in the US/UK there was lots of talk about just this as the non manufacturer approved bars mounted onto engine mounting points and not chassis frame which in the event of an accident it pushed the engine into the passenger compartment. I believe that these are banned now........can't remember how long ago it was though.

To griser

I understand your point, but can you understand the problem I just described. Can you be sure that all bars made here in thailand mount to points on chassis where it wouldn't bypass the crumple zones etc.

We're just having a discussion so no need to be so touchy about it!!!!

I don't get it. How could you mount a front bar all he way back to the engine mounts which is attached to the chassis anyway?

I would love to know how and why they would do this. I think in the context of this topic you can be assured that any bars get bolted to the chassis up front.

Maybe you were talking about mini cars or something where the engine is way forward and there isn't really any chassis that you could speak of but on pick ups here it would be big job to try and do that.

The bars here are such light grade steel, rubber, plastic that in a big accident will not make any difference to the outcome and most are approved by the manufacturer to not interfere with the SRS airbag system, but it's worth checking out.