Uhhh, you forgot to mention welded wheel studs. Those sons of ******* are holding the wheels on...
Trust me when I say we know the controversy of bolt vs. welded. The one point that often gets lost in translation, and I think you hit on it rather well is the integrity of the welder doing the work. Corey has a good buddy that was severly injured from a weld breaking in a bad roll over a while back. Bottom line, just cause it welded, doesn't always make it better. It wasn't long ago the vast majority of Class 7 trucks had bolt in cages.
A few months ago legendary Ford Rough Rider Dave Ashley was at the shop for a few hours and this very topic came up. Dave has better knowledge than almost anyone in this subject because he still volunteers himself to be a roll over dummy for Ford. One thing he couldn't stress enough is how strong the new A-Pillars are on these trucks. This isn't to say re-inforcement is a bad idea, but rather to make the point Ford has given us a very strong cab to build around.
I always cringe when I hear people on the internet speaking in absolutes when they have no clue of the design concept or have 100% of the design details. Personally, from what Jimmy has released, it appears to be a very well thought out product and I'm glad he pointed out the strength of grade 8 bolts. If a very bad rollover happened, you would be more likely to break the weld from the plate than break off 4 grade 8 bolts on each mounting plate.
Either way, I know this debate isn't going away anytime soon and I told the wife I would actually take a day off from the Raptor world for 1 day now that I'm home from SEMA.
Good job Jimmy,
