Steel bars.

From what I've seen
Steel bars don't flex at the wings as much as alloy
Steel can be painted every so often to tidy them up
you can weld things to steel bars easily
you can use a high lift jack on one.

I have the factory alloy bar. flexes at the ends a lot on corrugations. it's a bastard to keep it polished. it stains real easy. but... it''s one of the nicest looking bars around IMO and it does (and has already done) what it's designed to do and protect your panel work and radiator from errant skippy's. my 2c

I mainly didnt want to have to polish mine so I went steel.

I love the look of my alloy bar but it is a pain to keep clean. After a day in the mud, if I don't get to it straight away it stains. The more I want to do with my d22 the more I consider swapping to a steel bar. There were no points on mine for an antenna. There are 2 holes for lights but that is it. I was thinking about a winch and to do that the alloy won't cut it.

alloy bars are lighter. less strain on front suspension and lower fuel bill.
also if the steel bars are to solid when you hit something they won't bend, they will tranfer the impact straight to the chassis which can buckle the chassis.

Wow, I've never noticed a whole lot of flex on the wings of anything besides crappy steel nudgebars, but then again I've never hammered a washboard road for 700 kilometres.

There are some really good points for both sides of the fence but I reckon the corrosion-Nazi and tare-weight-Nazi in me will win out in the end. I want a winch but it isn't hard to mount it on a galvanised steel subframe behind the alloy bar. I never want to mount antennas or driving lights on the bar and foggies are sorted.

You could always paint/powdercoat an Ally bar to overcome the polishing.

big_col said:

I love the look of my alloy bar but it is a pain to keep clean. After a day in the mud, if I don't get to it straight away it stains. The more I want to do with my d22 the more I consider swapping to a steel bar. There were no points on mine for an antenna. There are 2 holes for lights but that is it. I was thinking about a winch and to do that the alloy won't cut it.

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Sorry to momentarily get off track Pro-Nav2.7TDi, but..big_col i hear you on the staining. not much of cleaning it in the middle of nowhere when you're away for a while. I take to mine with a machine buff and follow up with metal polish and she comes up good. These factory Nissan bars are made by TJM. if you haven't already sorted it, I got them to give me one of the antenna tabs from their bars and had it TIG'd on and polished it up myself. looks factory

i'm gonna get a TJM steel one someday soon. just been putting it off. Maybe i can rewire the fog light switch on the indicator stalk for spotlights? anyone know if thats possible...maybe? (cause fogs is when park on, spots is when highbeam is on)

I had ECB alloy bar for mine has been strong enough to take on roos has aerial tabs and I have been told I can fit a winch still.
Im with you guys on staining tho i use bug and tar remover its cheap and shines well with less work

tweak'e said:

also if the steel bars are to solid when you hit something they won't bend, they will tranfer the impact straight to the chassis which can buckle the chassis.

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This is a good consideration I have failed to make. I gave skip a headache just short of wilpena a couple of months ago. he cracked the poxy plastic little guard underneath and put a slight woof in the bottom of the bar (barely noticible) what is noticeable is the gap between the wing of the bar and the bottom of the wheel arch flare closed up about 5mm and I don't think there's much adjustment at the mounting bolts. I suppose if it was steel it wouldn't have moved at all. how hard an impact on a bar could bend the chassis and at that point, wouldn't you have quite a broken vehicle in other areas by then?

i figure if you hit something that hard you would of bent it anyway

Just for the record I saw a factory navara alloy bar a couple of days ago with an electric winch fitted so it is definitely possible. Unfortunately I only saw it from the other side of the traffic lights so didn't get a good look.

Jon said:

Just for the record I saw a factory navara alloy bar a couple of days ago with an electric winch fitted so it is definitely possible. Unfortunately I only saw it from the other side of the traffic lights so didn't get a good look.

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Could be mounted on a steel subframe hidden behind the bar, I think my old man's F-series is like that, that's an alloy TJM winch bar. That's what I'll be doing for my D21.

Anyone know how much a ARB Sahara bar is ?

Dave.

Pro-Nav2.7TDi said:

Could be mounted on a steel subframe hidden behind the bar, I think my old man's F-series is like that, that's an alloy TJM winch bar. That's what I'll be doing for my D21.

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Yes I would definitely expect that is what this guy has done although I would've liked to have a closer look and a chat too see exactly how it was done. There is a fair bit of room behind the bar so I don't think it would be too difficult. I quite like the alloy factory bar but mine isn't shiny at all which does annoy me.

Jon said:

I quite like the alloy factory bar but mine isn't shiny at all which does annoy me.

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How often have you been polishing it?

Pro-Nav2.7TDi said:

How often have you been polishing it?

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Ha ha, never! Only myself to blame, a mate has put me onto some stuff called purple polish apparently a lot of the truckies use it on their alloy barwork. I tried a bit on mine and it come up really good with very little work, just haven't got around to buying any yet. Going to get a bottle of the deoxidiser aswell. here's a link for anyone interested.

California Custom Catalogue

This thread has kinda gone off topic a little bit sorry about that guys.