This project was a good excuse to put my new Bosch jigsaw to work. I found this 16-gauge steel at the local hardware store and knew it had to find its way onto the 4Runner.
The stock running boards did a great job of keeping the sides of the truck rock chip-free. I took one trip to Death Valley with the open rock sliders and picked up about 40 rock chips per side, these steel inserts should prevent this in the future. (Traveling hundreds of miles on gravel roads at speeds up to 83 mph (by gps) does a great job of blasting paint off just about anything.)
It took a lot of work to match the bends of the sliders. Tubing benders have a tendency to push the outside of the bend further out before bending it inwards (if that makes any sense). Stubb's sliders are built on a jig and have extremely high quality control, but each of the six steel plates were still just slightly different. The welding itself took no more than about 15 minutes.
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. i have been wanting to do the same thing but more to help my daughter get in and out of the 4runner.
Originally Posted by garrett
