[honour]

Hey all!
I have just finished trimming my Jimny front arches to make way for new tyres, and thought I would post up the process and results.
I started with the BigJimny guide, however I found this was pretty undetailed, so wanted to put up some photos to hopefully help anyone else looking to do the same. Also, the main requirements for me were of course to allow for bigger tyres, but also retain the splashguards inside (don't want my door jambs filling up with mud), and also to provide mounting for flares to cover the extra width of the new tyres.
Please keep in mind, this is just a guide on what I did - it may not necessarily be suitable for you car.
Anyway, here goes -

Step 1.
Admire the flares in factory form and begin to wonder if this is going to end terribly.


Step 2.
Remove the plastic flare. There are about 6 clips from memory, they all pop out easily with a little tug. As well as the few in the wheel arch.


Step 3.
Trim the flat spot of the plastic arch, this is around an inch all the way around. Notice that this will remove all of the mounting tabs inside for the splashguard etc. This will be rectified later - don't worry.


Step 4.
Reattach the flare. the steel will now be hanging out below the plastic line.


Step 5.
Remove the inner splashguard.


Step 6.
Trace a line onto the steel, indicating the line of the plastic.


Step 7.
The BigJimny guide removes all of this steel, but I want to retain it for the splashguards and to create a flat surface for mounting flares. So rather than cutting it all out, slice into the steel into 'teeth' like sections. Slice up to the line you have drawn, and a couple of millimetres more, to allow for bending.


Step 8.
Bend the steel teeth up the create a relatively flat surface to mount your flare. There is already a 90 degree rim in the steel behind these teeth, which will help to hold the splashguard in place.



Step 9.
The splashguard needs to be refitted, however there are some sections which will need to be removed in order to get it to fit. This can be pretty roughly done, as it will all be hidden away anyway.
I removed the flat part which would normally sit behind the plastic removed, as well as the front section as it will now have no where to mount and will just flap around.


Step 10.
Trim the front bumper to suit.


Step 11.
Refit the splashguard. The existing plastic clips inside the arch will hold it nicely, and tucking the outer side behind the newly folded steel, it should hold in super tight.


Step 12.
Be sure to spray the newly cut steel to prevent rust.


Step 13.
Wanting to create as neat a finish as possible, I lined the new cut edges with pinchweld from Clark Rubber. (Their item #19907 - about $6.95/m)



Step 14.
Next up was the flares. Yep - I went for garden edging. $25 for a 10m, 75mm wide roll from Bunnings.
Cut a section roughly the length you will need to fill the arch.


Step 15.
Mark a line on the flare marking how far you want it to stick out. I used painters tape.


Step 16.
Mount the flare to the (relatively) flat steel area just created in the arch. I just used rivets. Very solid.




Step 17. Tidy up.
There are a couple of little details to fix up. For example, on the very bottom edge, there is nothing to rivet to, so I drilled a small hole through the bottom of the flare and the base of the original plastics and cable tied them together to prevent any of the new flare moving around. (This picture shows it before the cable tie - in the very bottom left of the arch.


Also the front of the original plastic flare, and the front bumper, now sit quite loose around this area as there are no mounting points anymore. I again drilled a small hole behind the visible face, and cable tied them together. Only just visible when looking up close.


There may also be a bit more trimming / styling of the flare that you may want to do (I am still yet to finish that element).

Step 18. Done!


Anyway, I hope that helps someone!
If anyone has any questions, let me know.
Cheers.
Scott.

[zukenutter]

Awesome Scott, That's the tidiest "BigJimny guard chop" I've seen. Actually I think it should be renamed the "AusZookers guard chop".
Great effort.

One thing I would have done different is run the pinchweld across the gap between guard and bumper to add rigidity between the two parts.

[pete_79]

Brilliant!!!
Tidiest AND most detailed.

The extra flares covering the folded flaps on the panel is a nice touch. Great work mate.

[honour]

Cheers guys!
Yeh that was originally the plan ZN, and it looked good. But I was a little worried about hitting the bumper and thus pulling on the flares. I have a bit of the pinchweld left over though, so may do that later.
Thanks again guys. And yeh - the AusZookers chop sounds good. Haha.

[Jezza86]

good tech, and I second the AZ guardchop.
step 18, go drive it!!!

Great work Scott. now i can take out my bodylift!!!

[Marko_SJ]

Good work, we'll have to do this to my brother's.

[cal213]

What size tyres are they?

[honour]

Hahaha. Cheers guys.
Cal123 - This is with a 2" OME suspension lift kit, and 235x75x15's.

[Jezza86]

My 30"s tread is 1mm inside the guards. Lol

[honour]

Wowsers!

[JayKay]

Very Cool, X3 on the AZ Guard Chop.

Got a couple pics from a distance, I need some convincing before I hack mine up.

[honour]

Here you go, JayKay.

[zukenutter]

going to do the rear to match?

[tanshi]

your tyres are gonna grab that flange on up travel and pull it down

[zukenutter]

^ hadn't thought of that but yeah with offset rims it probably will, although if you leave the sway bar on it'll probably not even come close. Depends on the shocks too.

[honour]

Pardon my ignorance - what flange?

[zukenutter]

I think he was calling the toothed folded lip the flange

[honour]

Ok cool. I don't think that with my current setup (2" OME lift springs and swaybars fitted), that the uptravel would be enough to go up under the guard, so it shouldn't be a problem (fingers crossed).
I have a day at Jakem this weekend though, so will see how it goes.

But yes, I see what you mean. If the tyre pushed up past the new garden edge trim, then would rip it back down on down travel. Something for those considering doing the chop to keep in mind. Perhaps using a much wider garden edge type material to cover the whole top of the wheel arch area, thus not giving an edge for the tyre to grab.

[pete_79]

I didn't get which part he meant by the flange either.

Maybe I'm way off the mark, but I thought he was talking about this bit.


It's the most obvious bit that could get caught on the tyre during up travel and I figured you would just trim it off anyway.

I haven't noticed anyone else talking about 235 tyres touching the top plastic insert right up inside the guard. I could be wrong though....

[tanshi]

yes, the "toothed folded lip"

if your tyres arent tucking up that far why are you even cutting the guards?

[honour]

Pete - Yes, this was the main problem area. The bit you circled was the section I explained (quite vaguely) that I cable tied back to the original plastics, so is well out of the way now. Just wasn't in that particular photo. But the further back photos show it all tied back out of the way.

Tanshi - The tyres were hitting mostly on the area just mentioned, but instead of just cutting the corners off, I wanted to make it all look as consistent as possible, hence removing the whole flat section. Although it might not reach all the way up there, I figure the more space the tyres have, the better.

[honour]

zukenutter wrote:

going to do the rear to match?

Yeh, eventually. There's no scrubbing there at the minute, so no rush. But it does need a bit of flare to cover the tyre sticking out, so will do it in the same fashion to keep it consistent.

[zukenutter]

Just cutting the corners off looks quite bad IMO. If you're going to cut it looks much better done evenly all the way around.

[honour]

zukenutter wrote:

Just cutting the corners off looks quite bad IMO. If you're going to cut it looks much better done evenly all the way around.

My thoughts exactly. I cut the corners off originally just to make it safe for a few days. But definitely looks better now.

[Zook2510]

This is great!! Thanks Scott for the details and photos.

[vet 180]

Looks great

[honour]

Thanks guys!

[jimbo_jones]

Very good write up you could go a step further and weld the cut after you bend them

[honour]

Certainly could Jimbo, would make for a much nicer finish. I actually just finished the rears up yesterday, so will put up a guide on that shortly.

[honour]

Hey guys - I have just uploaded the guide for the rears, please find it here -
viewtopic.php?f=14&t=50526