Recovery Points

[fido666 Banned Find all posts View Profile Close fido666]

I had a go at fitting my Roadsafe Recovery Points to the Kakadu with TJM bar yesterday but for the life of me can not find which hole in the chassis the nut on a wire gizmos would go through. If anyone with a TJM bar can post a pic that would be good.

[Rogerthatv2 Avid PP Poster! Find all posts View Profile Close Rogerthatv2]

I had a go at fitting my Roadsafe Recovery Points to the Kakadu with TJM bar yesterday but for the life of me can not find which hole in the chassis the nut on a wire gizmos would go through. If anyone with a TJM bar can post a pic that would be good.

I am fairly certain that the hole you need to mount is is used to mount the bar on the VX / Kakadu as the chassis mounts for this to the GXL are different. Mine are being fitted soon, we think we can do it with the T13 however I am waiting for my ARB steps to arrive before I take it to TJM Brendale to do it. Will let you know what I find. Cheers Dan

[fido666 Banned Find all posts View Profile Close fido666]

I am fairly certain that the hole you need to mount is is used to mount the bar on the VX / Kakadu as the chassis mounts for this to the GXL are different.

Not sure if I've misunderstood but I'm not referring to the mounting bolt locations, I'm after the hole in the chassis rail that you are supposed to pass the nut on a wire through to get it up behind the mounting bolt.

Will let you know what I find. Cheers Dan

Thanks Dan. It's just I happened to be under the Prado trying in vain to fit the winch again so had all the bash plates off the bar, shame I couldn't get either job done.

[brogers Advanced Member Find all posts View Profile Close brogers]

fido666,

The hole in the cghassis rail that you inster the "nut on a wire" is located about 20cm along the rail twoards the rear of the car from the higher recovery point bolt. The hole is in the side of the chassis rail, forward of the suspension spring and it measures about 45mm long and 20mm wide. I found it easier to jack the car up and remove the front wheel.

Lay the "nut on a wire" along the outside of the chassis rail, and line up the nut with the higher of the two bolt holes in the recovery point. The recovery point I got has three holes in it, but clearly the top most hole in the recovery point is not used when installing in the 150 GXL as far as I can tell.

Bend the end of the wire at about 90 degrees towards you horizontally at a point as close to the the front edge of the rectangular hole in the side of the chassis rail. (That way you should find it to line up the nut at the correct insertion depth along the chassis rail when you insert the wire.) You can then put another bend or two near the very end of the wire so you have something better to grip and turn and twist the wire with.

With the car jacked up (and secured jacked with handbrake and a rear wheel chock and a secondary support under the front...just in case the car falls), insert the nut through the chassis slot and hold your tongue right and line up the nut with the recovery point bolt. The first one took me about 15 minutes of twisting and turning and mucking about until I finally got the bolt threaded into the nut. The second one (with more room as I wised up and removed the front wheel to give me more light and space), took me all of about 5 seconds to line up...phew.

I hope that helps. That's what I did anyway...and it worked for me. Don't forget the washers as you don't want to have to undo it all, and then do it again if you forget to put the washer under the bolt head.

BTW, after doing it all up, I trimmed some length from the wire protruding fromthe chassis hole, and I then bent the end of the wire back on itself and poked the pointy end back into the rectangular hole in the chassis. I left a small bend of wire protruding from the chassis rail, just so I can remove it and do it again easily if ever I need to. I am not sure if this is the best thing to do, and I hope the piece of wire doesn't become a source of rust in the chassis rail, but if needed i guess I can just grab the wire again with some multi grips and twist it back and forth and bust it off at the nut...comments/thoughts?

[fido666 Banned Find all posts View Profile Close fido666]

Thanks for that Brogers, I'll have a look later to see if I can find the spot you mention. Which points did you get and which bar do you have?

I had a look under both front wheel arches. On the driver's side I can see a rectangular hole in front of the suspension spring but on the passenger side it appears to be behind it. I'm not sure if the locations are different on the Kakadu because of KDSS components.

[brogers Advanced Member Find all posts View Profile Close brogers]

Thanks for that Brogers, I'll have a look later to see if I can find the spot you mention. Which points did you get and which bar do you have?

I got some rated recovery points from "Road Runner Offroad"
http://www.roadrunneroffroad.com.au/...ery-Point.html

I don't have a bull bar as yet, and you may be correct, your chassis might be different on the Kakadu.

[fido666 Banned Find all posts View Profile Close fido666]

I got some rated recovery points from "Road Runner Offroad"

These are the ones I have also. Which of the top 2 holes did you use when mounting?

[brogers Advanced Member Find all posts View Profile Close brogers]

These are the ones I have also. Which of the top 2 holes did you use when mounting?

I used the lower two holes in the recovery point. You've got me thinking why, but I think it was simply a case that the uppermost hole in the recovery point just didn't line up with anything on the 150 GXL.

When I refer to uppermost, I am talking about the recovery point being held in position, and its the highest hole, furtherest away from the existing factory tie down point.
I put a bolt through the lower most hole (closest to the existing factory tie down point), and I didn't even need a nut for this lower bolt, as the hole already had a thread for the bolt.

I guess this is where your bar is already mounted which is what is making the whole recovery point install tricky for you. You might need some sort of modification in order to mount the recovery point effectively.

I'm not sure if that helps you much I am sorry, and I can't upload pics or video (yet), but good luck with all.

Just an aside, I was driving around Indian head on Fraser Island, when a "softroader" in front of me got bogged, surprise surprise, but then I had to stop in the softest section of the track, lost momentum and got bogged. If I had some MAXTRACKS I would have been out in an instant no doubt, but we connected an equaliser strap to both front factory tie down points, and then a snatch strap to the equaliser strap and we pulled the Prado out, and the factory tie down points didn't bend or distort at all, and in fact from memory I think the Toyota manual even describes using the factory tie down point for recovery purposes....but....I know the factory "tie down" point is not a rated recovery point, and there have been instances where they have broken or damaged the chassis etc, and we wanted to have something more solid , especially if we get seriously bogged, so we got some recovery points, .....and I now also have some maxtracks, so I will most likely never need the front recovery points in that sort of situation again. Take care

[fido666 Banned Find all posts View Profile Close fido666]

So referring to this pic :-



You didn't use the bolt hole at the very top of the pic? That's an FJ Cruiser in the pic hence why all 3 bolts are used.

[brogers Advanced Member Find all posts View Profile Close brogers]

So referring to this pic :-



You didn't use the bolt hole at the very top of the pic? That's an FJ Cruiser in the pic hence why all 3 bolts are used.

Correct, that top hole is unused on my install.

The bottom bolt one lined up with an existing bolt hole and thread already in the chassis, the middle one I used the "nut on a wire" inserted through the chassis rail and the top one is currently vacant. I'll have another look over the next few days (when the rain stops) and just make sure the top hole doesn't line up with a hole in the chassis like the one in the picture, but I would definately be loathe to drill a hole in the chassis.

[fido666 Banned Find all posts View Profile Close fido666]

Don't worry too much about the extra bolt in the pic, remember that's of an FJ Cruiser. I was just curious as when I was test fitting the points it seemed like one of the bolts in my TJM bar might get in the way. I'll check again as maybe I was trying to line up the wrong bolt hole.

[ko762 Moderated member Find all posts View Profile Close ko762]

Hi all - a quick question:

For those of you who have installed these recovery points with bullbars...........

Did you have to space the upper bolt hole away from the chassis rail to keep the recovery point parallel to the chassis rail?

Much like the set up in the above photos, I have a Smart bar and the bracket of the bull bar that attaches to the chassis rail is around 4mm thick steel which looks like it would then cause the recovery point to no longer run parallel to the rail and point outwards slightly.

I haven't purchase the recovery points yet but have foreseen this as a possible issue. Without it running true, Im concerned it could place great stress on the recovery points and also the bolts when they are tightened up. I guess putting equal thickness washers under the top mount hole might space it outwards but it seems a bit dodgey....

Any comments/ideas?

Thanks,

Ken

[whisky Lurker Find all posts View Profile Close whisky]

For those of you who have installed these recovery points with bullbars...........

Did you have to space the upper bolt hole away from the chassis rail to keep the recovery point parallel to the chassis rail?

I've got an ARB bar with the Everything 4wd points, (they look exactly the same as the ones from road runner). I've used the top and bottom holes as they lined up with the bolts used to mount the bar and no spacers needed.

Not sure if it will be the same for your Smart bar though...

[JPH Advanced Member Find all posts View Profile Close JPH]

Fido here is a shot of mine, although it is a GXL with an ARB bar. The top bolt hole has the nut on a rod and the bottom bolt has a thread on the inside of the Chassis. Both bolts go through my bullbar mounts. To get the nut on a rod in I quickly removed my bar from the chassis mounts, and inserted it in through the end of the chassis. From memory the plates the nut was welded to was too wide to fit into the opening in the chassis, so i cut the corners off with the angle grinder. I found this the quickest way of doing it, spending maybe an hour all up. Mind you I did utilise my forklift and a few slings to take the weight of the bullbar while I fitted them. Aah the joys of a factory and some handy machinery. If you get stuck I'm more than happy to help you out at the upcoming tech day.



Cheers

Josh

[rwo Advanced Member Find all posts View Profile Close rwo]

I just fitted up my Roadsafe points from Road Runner Offroad, pretty impressed with the fit and manufacture of the points and the extra included bolts which saved my arse (although they wouldn't be extra if you were using all 3 holes).

The whole job took about an hour and a half including pulling all my crap out and putting it away again. The biggest drama I had was with one of the front nuts (the welded in ones) that the useless pricks at ARB flogged out when fitting the bar (the more time I spend working on the front of the car, the more I regret letting them do the bar install???), but once I forced a bolt through and swapped it for a spare one I managed to get it tensioned up tight enough (I'll be keeping an eye on this anyway).

The best tip I can give is get yourself one of those flexible magnet things for fishing out ARB's "nut on a rod", I used mine to feed the rod back towards the front spring and when I could reach the end I grabbed it with the pointy-nose pliers and ripped it out the hole, each side took no more than a few minutes to get free.

I also spent a fair bit of time jacking up and supporting the bar before I got started, IMHO this was probably wasted effort as when I pulled the side wings off I noticed there is a 3rd nut higher up on the mounting plate side and another one of the inside of the chassis rail, neither of which I would be undoing so there was minimal chance of the bar moving even with the other two undone (do one side at a time).

I had the rectangle holes about 100mm back from the bolt hole and just in front of the springs on each side, this is where I inserted the "nut on wire", just put a few strategic bends in the wire, line it up with a torch and juggle the recovery point/bolt/wire and you will get it started pretty easily. I also snapped the tails off the plates (I have 4 spares and didn't want them scratching around inside the chassis).

My points were installed as per JPH's photo using the lower and upper holes, not the one in the middle.