ARGO Bigfoot plow mounts

[Mr_Riveter]

Hello All,

I am trying to come up with an idea for an ARGO Bigfoot plow mount. I've seen the straight ones bolted on at the bearing extensions (6 bolts) and I've seen the ones curved at the bearing extensions but I'm looking for a better idea. Can you please post pictures of your plow attachment for me? Thanks!

Oh yeah, I also want to make an aluminum skid pan because our terrain is really rocky so I'd love to see pictures of those ideas too!

[Rock Doctor]

Can't help with the plow mounts, but IMHO I think that an aluminium skidplate would be a bad thing (no offence intended).
Aluminium will NOT slide over rocks at all, in fact it grabs on and holds tighter than you would think. My experience with this comes from Jetboating in the rivers around my place. Most jetboats here are made of aluminium, and in an effort to make the boats slide across rocks and gravel bars, they either have Teflon (UHMW) plastic bolted to the bottom or they have high tensile steal skidplates bolted down the keel.

Are you looking to re-inforce your bottom, or make the machine slide over the rocks better? Does your machine already have a Factory "plastic" skidplate??

Just a little something to think about before you go to all the effort of building a skidplate out of aluminium.

RD

[Mr_Riveter]

Skidplate for Argo Bigfoot

Actually I do have a factory skidplate already on the ARGO but it too is getting pretty scraped up after only 32 hours. I opted to go with aluminum because it is lighter and I think the argo already sits low in the frontend in water. I don't need any added weight there. Do you have any suggestions other than aluminum? Thanks

[salamander]

I thought the skidplate seemed frail at first, but I have come to trust it. Grinding over a lot of Canadian Shield granite scratched my skidplate up quick, it lost its shiny new look fast, but a year has passed now and I have failed to take any really deep gouges out of it yet. I will wait to replace it until I have to, I could see that taking a long time.

The factory plow mounts on my bigfoot attatch to the bearing extensions with only 3, not 6 bolts, and those would be the three to the back of the plow mount, closest to the driver. The mounts themselves have a bend outwards, to accommodate the factory plow which is wider than the Bigfoots body. There are 3 sets of holes to choose to attatch the plow to on the front end, giving you a choice of a more or less aggressive blade angle.

[Rock Doctor]

I've been thinking about this a bit, and I think that I would go with Salamanders idea.
I too have spent my fair share of time "rock Crawling", and have scored the bottom of my skidplate up pretty good. I think I would replace the skidplate (IF needed) when the time comes rather than put something there to protect it.

If I absolutly had to protect the bottom in some way, I think I would mold a piece of 1/4" or 3/8" (UHMW) Teflon to the bottom, and bolt it through with countersunk bolts (seal them with silicone and ruberback washers) and nylock nuts.

RD

[philipatmaxfour]

skid plate

My 2 cents are in Canadian dollars. They ain't worth much. I agree with salamander and Rock doctor. The factory skid plate is pretty tough. If you want to do something else,you can make a skid plate out of HDPE using a heat gun and a lot of work talk to Hydro Mike or see if he has a posting about it under Attex

[Mr_Riveter]

My 2 cents are in Canadian dollars. They ain't worth much. I agree with salamander and Rock doctor. The factory skid plate is pretty tough. If you want to do something else,you can make a skid plate out of HDPE using a heat gun and a lot of work talk to Hydro Mike or see if he has a posting about it under Attex

Actually, I am only looking to create a skid plate for the very front of the ARGO, kind of a skid plate over the skid plate. I will attach a photo of a friends but I'm actually looking for "other" ideas. Now this skid plate only needs to extend about a foot under the ARGO and up about 8 or so inches.

[Rock Doctor]

I would be strongly tempted to try the UHMU. The stuff I have on the bottom of my boat is only 1/4" thick, but has taken some tremendous impacts.

The following vid does NOT show the boat bottom, but it does give an idea of what I call light impacts. Watch how the boat jolts when I hit the rocks. Very noticable at .55 and .59.
The boat bottom is 1/4" aluminium with the UHMW bolted to it with 5/16" countersunk bolts.

And in this one, my daughter is driving and hits a "sweeper" (tree) at about 1:00. I didn't even try to correct her, I knew it had survived worse

Hope this helps

RD

[Mr_Riveter]

I'm not to sure about the UMHU or IMHO. I know nothing about the material, where you find it, how much it costs or how to shape/form it. I do know how to work with aluminum and I am including a photo here to show you. This is the kind of skid plate I was thinking of.

As you can see, it doesn't cover the entire underbody, its only to prevent the initial impact of hitting rocks here in Atlantic Canada.

[Rock Doctor]

UHMW PLASTIC Ultra High Molecular Weight Polyethylene is light weight (12% lighter than ABS), has a high tensile strength and is as simple to machine as ..........Bla Bla Bla

You should be able to Google a suplier near you

(I believe that IMHO is short for "In My Humble Opinion")

My only concern was about covering the Argo bottom. If you are just doing the front, I say "Go for it", and please let us know how it works out.

Actually, I have seen one Argo that had a hole punched into the front, down low where that plate covers the front in the pic. It was from a piece of steel pipe that was sticking out of the frozen ground on a cutline. (Friends Argo) I thought it was quite funny, untill I got roped into helping him replace the tub.

RD

[Mr_Riveter]

Ok, will do. I will definitely come up with some sort of a plate like the picture of my buddies that I posted above. I intend to shape a piece of aluminum as close to the front shape of the argo as possible and have a right angle piece about 4 square inches protrude forward. A piece on each side if you will that can be drilled through and bolted to the plow mounts that stick forward which are bolted to the axle extensions.

Hopefully you can picture this in your head. I believe that this will be the way to protect that initial impact on a rock or steel road as your buddy experienced.

[bcsteve]

Mr Riveter, I noticed in your post you mentionned "Atlantic Canada". Where are you from??

[Mr_Riveter]

BCSteve, thanks for asking. I live just outside of Halifax Nova Scotia. It's definitely bush country with lots of rocks, lakes and trees. It's an outdoor paradise. There are also lots of deer, rabbit, the occasional moose and bear! Moved here from Southwestern Ontario.

[bcsteve]

Cool, I grew up in Bathurst in NB, moved to BC in 1999.

[Rock Doctor]

Cool, I grew up in Bathurst in NB, moved to BC in 1999.

Interesting,
Where, again, are you in BC...........Near lonely "Ft Nelson" by any chance?

Maple Ridge is ringing a bell for some reason.


RD