Review of Off Road Body Armor products

[airshot]

   As a Kymco owner I have been watching the products from Off Road Body Armor for some time now. We Kymco owners are aware of the fact the aftermarket products are few and far between so when comes along we tend to not want to be the first to buy it. We all want the safety of others spending their money first to see how good it really is. Well after looking at the products and talking to the owner, I felt confident enough to order a rear bumper and a pair of the tree kickers. My parts arrived this week, well packaged and wrapped, so I immediately opened the box to see what my hard earned money got me. My first impression was wow this box is heavy, obviously not made from thin walled exhaust tubing and removing them from the carton confirmed my suspicions, these things are quite hefty, well built, nothing flimsy here. With them came a set of mounting instructions and the necessary fasteners to install. Oh ya and a neat little sticker for your machine to show off your new bling. Mounting the rear bumper was pretty straight forward with 4 bolts bolting up thru holes already in the base of the dump box, not thru the dump box but in a mounting plate under the dump box. They are already threaded from the factory so just bolting it in place is all that is needed.  You will begin to realize the heft of these bumpers as you try holding them up and bolting them in place. The tree kickers will require you to elevate your machine enough so you can get under it to install them. You need to remove the three mounting holes for the outboard skid plates as these holes will be used for the tree kickers. I would also recommend removing the center plastic screw and plug used to hold the plastic in place, this one will not be needed due to the tree kicker being mounted there but if it makes you feel better then add two well nuts over 1 1/4" inch from this center hole, one on each side, this will assure your plastic stays together. The plastic mounts simply connect the side panel and the skid plate together, they don't support any weight or add to any structure support so whether you add the well nuts or not will not make any difference. I posted another article about these well nuts in another post on this forum. Getting back to the tree kicker install...as a tool maker for 48 years I know and understand how fasteners work so I will just make a suggestion here, drill a 1/4" hole in the front and rear location where you removed the skid screws, yes drill these holes out to the 1/4" hole, then use the impact driver to install the front and rear self threading bolts. By doing the 1/4" hole first you will get an even stronger bite into the frame material. After front and rear bolts are installed the do the same with the center mounting hole. Once done you have a very strong attachment to your machine, I jumped up and down on mine with no movement and I am quite confident that running thru the woods around some tight trails and trees the tree kickers will do the job of moving your machine over to prevent the plastic from becoming damaged. Not only that but the COOL factor is there in the appearance. When I completed the install I decided to use a straight edge under my machine to see if the kickers were above or below the bottom most part of my undercarriage. Obviously the manufacturer of these did his homework as they tend to drop less then a 1/4" below the bottom of my skid plates, just enough to keep any rock or stump from pushing up and thru, yet not dropping below enough to take away from the ground clearance of this machine.
  When I first saw these items I thought they might be a bit pricey and made me hesitate, then I did some research on other tree kickers and accessories for other brands. I quickly learned that the price was reasonable if not a bargain when compared to the cost and quality of other brands. Off road Body Armor makes a good quality product that will make your Kimco look good and help protect the plastic body and the wheels if you do tight trail riding. So far I am quite pleased with the build quality and the appearance of their products, kind of makes me want to go out and run into something just to try them out.

[Driemeyer25]

Thanks Ken, having you as a customer is a blessing! Thanks for the pictures as well.
Offroadbodyarmor.com

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G920A using Tapatalk

[jew8201]

Can't wait to pick up my machine outfitted front to rear with ORBA accessories! Airshot did you do the two well nuts you were talking about on the plastics with the tree kickers?? I will look mine over good before putting in on the trailer. The dealer is installing all the accessories for me! Which is nice but at the same time I like to do what I can myself. But none the less they should be completed when I pick her up.

[airshot]

    The factory plastic inserts that hold the panels together work fine..the first time...but trying to reuse them is not always successful. They use a plastic screw in a plastic insert, and generally the plastic screw head gets buggered when you remove it and the plastic insert sometimes breaks when you try to reuse it. When ever I have had to remove the panel connectors I don't even bother trying to reuse them, instead I just replace them with wellnuts. These are always reusable, I use SS screws so they are reusable. Actually been using them for years in my boat projects and they work great.

[randyo]

screw head gets buggered when you remove it

I have to ask, did you use  JIS screwdriver or a Phillips screwdriver

I have never seen an asian motorsports product use Phillips screws as they are designed to strip before the screw damages the object being fastened, what looks like a Phillips is really a JIS

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_screw_drives

The JIS B 1012 is commonly found in Japanese equipment. It looks like a Phillips screw, but is designed not to cam out and will therefore be damaged by a Phillips screwdriver if it is too tight. Heads are usually identifiable by a single dot or an "X" to one side of the cross slot.[18]

Specific "JIS" standardized cruciform-blade screwdrivers are available for this type of screw.

The Phillips screw drive was created by John P. Thompson, who after failing to interest manufacturers, sold his design to businessman Henry F. Phillips.[7][8] Phillips is credited with forming a company (Phillips Screw Company), improving the design, and promoting the adoption of his product.[7] The original patent[9] expired in 1966, but the Phillips Screw Company continued to develop improved designs.[7]

The American Screw Company of Providence, Rhode Island was responsible for devising a means of efficiently manufacturing the screw, and successfully patented and licensed their method; other screw makers of the 1930s dismissed the Phillips concept because it called for a relatively complex recessed socket shape in the head of the screw — as distinct from the simple milled slot of a slotted type screw. The Phillips screw design was developed as a direct solution to a number of problems with slotted screws: easy cam out, precise alignment required to avoid cam out and damage, and difficulty of driving with powered tools.

Phillips drive bits are often designated by the letters "PH",[7] plus a size code 0000, 000, 00, 0, 1, 2, 3, or 4 (by order of increasing size); the numerical bit size codes do not necessarily correspond to nominal screw size numbers.[5][10]

A Phillips screw head is significantly different from a PoziDriv;[7] see #Pozidriv section of this article for details.

The design is often criticized for its tendency to cam out at lower torque levels than other "cross head" designs. There has long been a popular belief that this was actually a deliberate feature of the design, for the purpose of assembling aluminum aircraft without overtightening the fasteners.[11] Evidence is lacking for this specific narrative and the feature is not mentioned in the original patents.[12] However, a subsequent refinement to the original design described in US Patent #2,474,994[13][14][15] describes this feature.

you're better off using the cheesey reversible screwdriver that comes with the tool kit, as it is a JIS, and not a Phillips if you don't have a set of JIS screwdrivers

[airshot]

    I never received a tool kit with my machine and yes I was able to get most of them out but they are so soft you can't tightened them hardly at all. Just not worth the trouble at all. A wellnut fits in the hole and holds better and is so much easier to install and replace repeatedly.

[jew8201]

The off road body armor accessories if you own one of these UXV 450i and don't have them do yourself and your machine a huge favor and get them ALL!!! They are well worth it. Kurt and his team there has done a fantastic job with them. The fit and finish is excellent. The welds are perfect. No modifications needed to the machine to make the accessories fit. They bolt right on and are very strong. The doors they are genius. I love that they lift right off like a jeep door. I will say when the door isn't latched don't lean on them or put any weight on the pin that holds them. They aren't designed to bear weight I don't think when unlatched. Don't take that wrong they ARE STRONG DOORS. When they are latched (bear claw latches with cotter pin just like a car door) you can by all means lean out an over the door putting weight on them when it's closed. Does that make sense?Anyway just buy them!!! You want be sorry. Kurt is down to earth and great to deal with. Their customer service is 5 star. If not for him I would of never gotten my accessories financed in to my deal. Never crossed my mind. In the process ORBA was able to add another dealer to their network. I feel for what you get the price is very fair. Besides who else makes anything for our machines?! They really complete the look of the UXV 450i. I couldn't be happier.

[jew8201]

One thing I wanted to add....if you look at the tree kickers in the pic. On the left side on the rear it doesn't look like there is much clearance for the tire...your correct there wasn't. After great customer service, myself and the dealer, spoke with Kurt, the tree kickers have a left and a right. The dealer had them on opposite sides first go round. They swapped them and now they are on correctly and plenty of tire clearance at all corners. Very sturdy, I can stand on them and rock the machine.

[airshot]

    I agree totally....real quality products!