Sliders are a mandatory mod if you want to protect your rocker panels while 4wheeling. Richard Stubbs of Stubbs Welding out of California is meeting the demand for 4Runner sliders by making some high quality, fairly priced gear. The following shows how my brother and I installed the Stubbs sliders on my rig.
Materials and equipment: Stubbs sliders, 3/16" steel flat stock, grinder, chop saw, and welder.
First off I painted the sliders (except for the end of the mounting brackets) with a rattle can.
The running boards were removed a while ago, so the next step was to hold the sliders up to the truck and mark the mounting-points. Then I ground the paint off the frame. Air tools come in really handy at times like this. An angle grinder works well too.
As suggested by Richard Stubbs, we added frame reinforcement plates. Since the frame of the 4Runner is perfectly straight, we decided to weld the plates to the sliders first which would simplify the welding to the truck and allow us to clamp the sliders to the frame. I cut six 3"x3" plates, rounded the edges, and watched my brother weld them to the sliders.
Here are some shots of the slider clamped to the frame and ready to weld. We left just over 1/4" of a gap between the sliders and the pinch weld on the body.
Here's my little brother welding and the final welds. No boogers by my bro!
After painting the exposed metal, we pulled her outside to view our handywork. She's finally ready for the rocks!
