ARB skid plate set and the plastic bumper

I purchased and installed the same ARB underbody armor, and most the bolts lined up, but I have a WT with the metal front bumper. Is something in the way? Did you have the stock two front bash plates when purchased? The only thing that did not fit on my Bronco were the front three Allen bolts that are supposed to connect to the splash guard, which I don't have. I'm pretty happy with the set up and it gives me some comfort knowing that I can scrape through something now without hitting my transfer case.

Jeff Ross

I purchased and installed the same ARB underbody armor, and most the bolts lined up, but I have a WT with the metal front bumper. Is something in the way? Did you have the stock two front bash plates when purchased? The only thing that did not fit on my Bronco were the front three Allen bolts that are supposed to connect to the splash guard, which I don't have. I'm pretty happy with the set up and it gives me some comfort knowing that I can scrape through something now without hitting my transfer case.

No, the product is great. I like how it’s well designed with the fastener heads are protected. ARB makes some serious products. It just doesn’t work with the tow hook brackets. The holes are about a 1/2” off.

I’m going to explore under there this morning before it gets too hot in the garage.

The front two skid plates are a bit tricky as they can be removed for maintenance.
Make sure you get the holes correctly lined up.
I had to fiddle with my plates a bit. Also, directions say to leave a lot of the bolts loose.

Please keep us PBP’s (Plastic Bumper People) updated… thanks!

I purchased these parts from Ford Parts and installed them today. I will attempt the skid plate install tomorrow morning. I have high hopes these new brackets will align with the holes. They are very similar to the tow hook brackets that I took off though. But hopefully it will make a difference.

Dahveed

I recently purchased a new 2024 Bronco Outer Banks with the sasquatch package. Now I'm in the process of fixing some of the vehicle's "areas for improvement" and the first on that was the underbody armor. It came stock with a plastic front skid plate which seems unlikely to provide any real protection.

After searching for a while, I purchased the ARB set of 4 underbody panels and the vendor that sold them to me boldly proclaimed "this fits your vehicle!" This turned out to be only partially true. Everything went well until we attempted to install the front most skid plate. The holes didn't line up. Going to the ARB website resulted in new information that this WON'T fit my vehicle with the front tow hooks under that plastic bumper.

Now I'm coming to the braintrust here because I cannot be the first person to have this problem. My question is if I swap out the tow hook brackets for non-tow hook brackets, will the skid plate fit?

The part I believe I need to order is part number MB3Z6G079B and A. Is this part compatible with my Bronco (Ford thinks it is)? And will this solve my problem or is it just a waste of money?

I appreciate your replies and thoughtful input.

I have a '22 OBX that I added this set to when I still had the factory plastic bumper. I have since switched to the metal capable Ford bumper which needed some metal grinding to keep the stock tow hooks that were mounted below but no such need for the ARB skids. I can get some pictures but if I recall correctly the issue was getting the front most bolts to grab since the tow hooks make it a tighter fit. What I did was get all the other bolts on and tightened then I could get the fronts to grab. It's been a few years and I don't remember the process BUT I see there is now a youtube video from Extreme Terrain that I didn't have the benefit of back then. I do see from skipping through their video that their rig has the plastic bumper AND they just installed it OVER the plastic "bash plate" splash guard which I may be revisiting now. I have been impressed and more confident in the ARB setup but never liked the narrower footprint leaving so much exposed real-estate on the sides. Here is a screen shot of their install vehicle. Plastic bumper and the lower mounted tow hooks are visible. These are stout plates, the hardest part of the install for me was crawing under and balancing these in one hand while using the other to operate my impact driver.

Just got finished installing the front plate. Changing those brackets did the trick. Still have one hole that was 90% aligned. But since the other plates were already torqued to spec, I just skipped that bolt for now. One I get it back on my buddies lift I can revisit that bolt hole. I’m not planning on any serious off roading for a fee months.

Next up is the bumper. Looking for a used Ford Modular bumper. Or something else.