The BETTER Light Bar Bracket - 42" Lower Grille Bracket

11/25 - Brackets and kits are NOW AVAILABLE!

https://hotshotoffroad.com/collecti...r-bracket-kit-the-better-bracket-14-21-tundra


This is the place where I will document our R&D/development of Hotshot Offroad's in-house 42" Diode Dynamics light bar brackets for the 2014-2021 Toyota Tundra. A current-state photo will headline this thread followed by the process in the area below.

Once testing and development is complete this will be available for sale!

Overview - Diode Dynamics produces high quality light bars (especially for the money) with a good warranty and great optics.

Problem - Many OEM's fitment brackets are prone to wobble and deflection. Their R&D process for many vehicle specific brackets unfortunately does not match the quality of the lighting products they are intended to hold.

Solution - Create a product which allows end users some adjustability of their light bar mounted in the lower grille area of specifically a 2014-21 Tundra while building the product to a quality standard which removes all (or at least MOST) vibration and deflection while in use.

CURRENT STATE - Hotshot Bracket V2



OEM Diode Dynamics bracket for reference - This unit is known to wobble a lot over even the smallest of hits. We identified a few easy locations in which we were finding we could improve which will be discussed in the Hotshot V1 bracket.





Hotshot Offroad V1 Bracket - We chose to directly address a couple of items on this first attempt:

1. Overall strength - The OEM bracket is built using very thin steel. We were able to bend the ~8" straight section of the bracket by hand with not a ton of effort. We chose to combat this in a couple of ways:

• Thickness of steel used was increased by 20%. While it doesn't seem like a huge increase it adds a lot of strength into the overall system. Holding the brackets side-by-side on one's hand reveals a clear difference in heft.
• Gusset Supports - An easily identifiable area of weakness is at the 90deg angle between the frame and light bar mounts. We chose to incorporate a gusset that runs approximately 85% of the way down the straight section of the long lead. This should greatly improve overall rigidity through the entire system as load is distributed back into frame-supported plate.

2. Adjustability & Support of Light Bar - OEM bracket has a single point at the front of the bracket in which to affix the light bar. This would be fine... IF during normal driving conditions the light bar didn't want to point to the sky due to vibrations. Our adjustments:

• Addition of rear bolt track - We're unsure if the threaded hole on the back of the light bar is there by necessity during manufacturing or what, but it is certainly not used by the DD team to mount their light bars. We have decided to leverage the additional hole to create both an adjustment "track" as well as provide an additional attachment point for the light bar to the reinforced bracket.

3. Fit & Finish - The DD brackets unfortunately stick out past the bumper ever so slightly. We are thinking that this is to allow for people with shimmed out bumpers to still have a flush light bar... maybe? Either way, we definitely don't like the look.

• Single front mounting point - This location places the light bar slightly recessed and has the corners of the light bar meet at natural "corners" of the OEM bumper. While it doesn't appear that way at first glance the OEM front bumper is actually on a radius so recessing the light bar.

V1 Testing RESULTS - It is definitely more stable and secure than the DD brackets. No doubt about that. Still has a bit more deflection than we would like. I am going to assume that we will not be able to engineer out ALL vibration when someone is on a very washboard-ridden road, but we fully intend on this experiencing little to no movement when traversing most forest service roads, onto/off of bridges at highway speeds, etc.

Fitment and location of rear bolt track looks good. We are going to narrow the track just a tad.

Changes to make for V2 -

• Height adjustability - Feedback from early discussions indicate that some folks would like to be able to have the bar "floating" within the lower grille area. We will be planning on working some of those adjustments in.
• Deflection defense - During testing we found there to still be some movement across the cross-section of the upper-most bolt where the bracket attaches to the frame.

V2 Bracket -

1 - Height Adjustability - There's 2 changes that were made here:

• Slimming of final 2" of bracket - To allow for vertical mobility of the bracket we took out a small section of the last 1.5" of the bracket so that one could move the bracket up without having to clearance OEM bumper plastic. HOWEVER, my guy cut these brackets while we were away at SEMA and took the notch out of the BOTTOM of the bracket instead of the top . We're going to test this set as-is to test if the thinner section up front and the other changes took to move us in the right direction instead of wasting the metal. Knowing that the cutout will need to be flipped on the next iteration.
• Movement of bracket-frame holes. In the V1 bracket the light bar when nearly resting on the bumper has the bracket pushed up nearly as far as the slots will allow. We moved the cutout holes down 1/2" to allow for mobility within the entire mounting area.

2 - Deflection Defense - We added additional material across the entire top of the bracket at the frame mount with the hope that having more material in-line with the load will be enough to quiet the little movement that we do have left. We're doing everything we can to avoid moving to a 2-piece design or adding more welds or labor intensive activities which would in-turn drive costs and the resultant price up.

3 - Angle Adjustment - A slight adjustment was made to the angle between the frame plate and the light bar arm to aid in mounting.






SHOWING V2 to V3 mount hole adjustments (V2 bracket is inside of V3 leading to horizontal offset)




OEM vs Hotshot V1 vs Hotshot V2

 

Simply put... No. We're just some goons with a laser table, sheets of metal, a laser table, AND A DREAM. Our model has always been to over-engineer until it just works. We are using Fusion360 and I believe it does have those tools within in. We might try and mess with that a bit. Appreciate it!

General ETA we are shooting for will be to make them at least available for pre-order by BF weekend.

Final production of these will 100% be powdercoated black. We just aren't going to be putting finishing labor into them until we are happy with the design.

 

Do you have 1 or 2 spacers? I know that @TRDFerguson is running 2 spacers and the DD brackets, but I wouldn't recommend more than 1 spacer per side and our kit due to the length of the studs. We're working with thicker metal so she'd be CLOSE. If this is successful we did talk about making a spacer that has the light bar bracket built into it, but that's a down the road kind of thing. No promises

 

They have a single listing for their Tundra kits (which include both 30" and 42" versions). However, the actual brackets between the two light bar length options are actually entirely different mounts. Just wanted to make that clarification!

If this is one is a successful project I'll certainly crack the seal on some different options for folks!

 

Quick video update on how things are going. Apologies on the dirty windshield! This is the Hotshot Offroad V2 bracket and as you can see we have nearly no deflection of the light beam itself on the roadway ahead. It's snow covered and decently rough. Run to the end of the video for some rough railroad tracks!

The very hard hits have a tiny bit of deflection (which we expected), but I think getting good hardware and locking washers in there will further clean this up to squash everything else. The movement that we are experiencing would be zero on anything aside from the roughest roads so we're pretty happy with it! Making some quality of life adjustments to the brackets to allow them to sit against the frame a little better, and moving the notch to the proper side, but we should be ready for pre-orders this upcoming week!

Might even have a BF pre-order sale on them if you pick one up with a light bar (which also just may be on sale )

https://youtu.be/-vpUjit5e28

 

Heard that!

I don't "think" we'll do a formal customer prototype since we have a good test subject to work off of and make changes in real time, but I can tell you that if you're an early adopter you'll be able to get the brackets at a reduced rate as we'll plan to discount them during that period. I'll just say this... I actually am really happy about the direction we're heading here on this, and know that anyone else who runs this will be too.

 

For those of you who want to bundle the light bar (which we just announced will be 30% off till 12/2) we're planning on opening up pre-orders for both of them here this week! Keep your eyes peeled, and we'll post up in here as well!

 

Punching up a full update now on these - In true novel fashion. KEEP YOUR EYES RIGHT HERE as the updates will be flowing today!