Reviews for WARN Elite Series Rear Bumper for 18-20 Jeep Wrangler JL
Solid bumper will stand up to weather over a long period of time with out rusting
Overall like the look of this. Had someone else install due to an accident so did not have to deal with that. The bolt (leveling bolt?) welds failed within 6 months but Warn had an entire new kit to me within about a week, no questions asked. Will see if this one lasts longer.
Purchased this bumper and tire carrier to hold my 37inch spare. I’m very pleased with the bumper/carrier and it feels very solid and looks good as well. Installation was very tedious trying to keep all the bolts aligned correctly when sliding the bumper on. The tire carrier part was simple and straight forward. If you are installing the rear bumper sensors, make sure you research proper placement of the sensors or they will go off constantly. You do not want to have to remove the bumper to fix. I gave up and turned my sensors off with my Tazer.
The tire carrier does come with a 3rd brake light relocation bracket that is adjustable. Even with my big 37 inch tire, the lowest setting still towered over the tire. I ended up drilling 2 more holes (that honestly should have been there in the 1st place) in the bracket that placed the light perfectly on top of my tire.
When installing the swinging tire carrier, there are two bolts that are supposed to adjust the carrier to be level. I did not have much luck with these because there’s not any weight on the carrier when you first adjust them. It is extremely difficult to get to the adjustment bolts once the Shell of the bumper is on. Not a big deal overall.
Another thing to note while installing, be very careful not to swing the carrier too far from the tailgate after running the camera wiring. You will tip the camera harness right out of the camera. I made this mistake and had to purchase a new harness.
Extra credit: This kit reuses the factory camera but doesn’t offer any shielding or protection for the camera. To remedy this, I ended up cutting the camera tube off of the OEM carrier with an angle grinder and reusing it. Whenever I have some free time I’ll try and make a video showing how I reused this part.
Warn should stick to winches. For the price and the Warn name I expected far better quality. Let’s start with the packaging. I ended up getting 3 tire carriers because the first two both showed up severely damaged and the hardware was all loose in the box, causing bolts, nuts and washers to scratch up and damage the carrier. The second one didn’t even make it off the FedEx plane in one piece, the shipper had to collect the hardware as it fell from the box. On the third one, there is still some cosmetic damage but far less than the first two.
Let’s talk about the bumper for a second, why a horrible design for the mounting brackets. They took the cheap answer and you’re left trying to match up 10 bolts held in with retaining rings almost simultaneously in order to secure it to the frame.
It’s also pretty clear they designed this with zero consideration to the effects their welds would have on assembly. On the brake light adapter it will not sit flush due to the weld on the carrier getting in the way, making it impossible to line up the holes and put in the required bolt. I tried all three adapters since I had three sitting around due to the shipping problems and they had the same problem. Additionally, due to the welds on the passenger side mounting bracket, they didn’t drill out the leveling hole all the way and every bolt we tried to put through would bottom out, luckily it set level on my frame as is. Finally, the tack welds on the leveling bolt for the flange the tire mounts on are extremely weak and will fail fairly easily.
Additionally, the bumper also showed up with minor cosmetic damage. Warn should seriously look at hiring a competent packaging engineer to better secure and ship their products. If this were a $400 bumper I would be more ok with it, but at nearly $2k, it’s unacceptable.
If you’re buying for the Warn name, don’t do it. I would recommend you strongly consider your other options.
I purchased this bumper thinking it would be high quality since warn is known for making arguably the best winches on the market. The look of the bumper is great and I really like how it wraps around the edges of the Jeep for some extra protection. However, this thing is a disaster. To install it you have to put bolts in the are held in place by lock washers. The problem is the lock washers don’t hold the bolts down so you end up having to work and wiggle loose bolts to get them to line up. I ended up having a buddy weld the washers on to hold the bolts in place which helped a little. I had a factory weld break on the tire carrier the day of install. The mounting bracket for the spare tire carrier does not line up with the bolts. Not even close. I had multiple people look at it to make sure I’m not crazy. I ended up getting professional help from some friends and we managed to get everything sorted out and mounted. The box showed up missing the third brake light relocation altogether. If you’re considering this bumper for the Warn name, I’d highly recommend looking at other options because this thing is expensive and definitely not worth price at all.