After 2 on road roll over my days were numbered my unbelivably lucky chances were over so i figured i needed a roll cage while showing my wife some pics (for approval) she said "do one of these" ponting to an exo skelleton cage, well she didnt have to twist my arm, so to the drawing board, i wish i still had a copy of what i came up with (very basic compared to what it ended up as) heres some shots before getting started, this is with the hydrolocked engine already pulled and in the shop, 5 speed trans sold, and case pulled and waiting for 6.5:1 gears.

I had to call in some help on this one as i had never done much tube bending, nor was my welder up to par, So through the forum i bumped into scott from lehi (now lives in illinois) he was very help full at helping me design what would work for my budget and driving style, we got to work right away and started striping the tub for the work to come, i have to admit all the tedious things needed for prep was killing me i wanted tubes welded on everywhere and i wanted them now! scott made sure it was done right so there was alot of prep, heres some shots of the teardown lots of sawzall work, we ended up taking 9" off each quarter panel, but doing it the hard way as to keep the tub floor intact so i could put rear bucket seats in. And away with the scary (temorary) front end work, getting the frame ready to be boxed

On to the new structure after wrestling with the idea of how to chop the floor out and move the quarter panels in we figured out that it wouldnt look right and the tail gate would be unusable so we figured by building the new structure out of 1" square tube and sheeting the new frame with 16 gauge steel we would be simplifiying and shaving weight at the same time, scott did not have a square die to bend the tube so he designed these flat plates with the proper curve in them, this part was very tedious and took a long time.

Here are some shots of the new panels, the passenger side panel was fomed by hand and took forever to look right, learning from our mistake the drivers side panel was taken to a local sheet metal shop and bent turning out just as nice in a 1/4 of the time
from the drivers seat looking out at the rear it looks as if ther is no back to the sami, very cool feeling

The front end was choped out and boxed using 2"x 4" .120 wall square tube, and gusseted with 1/4" plate inside and out, i wanted reciever hitches front and rear for recovery points, so 2"x 2" .250 wall square tube.

The rock sliders were designed to add on to the exsisting 4"x 4" .250 wall angle iron and tie to the frame (pics later) i wanted a step and to keep the rocks a few more inches away from the body, all the tube used in this build is .120 wall DOM scott triangulated these sliders for streth and clearance im very pleased with them as since this build ive beat the crap out of them with only miner scratches to show for it!

The front stinger is very old school and excentric much bigger than needed but this is the look i wanted i have always liked the over dramatic stinger, it measures 38" in lenth, the A pilar tube mocked into place shows how i wanted to keep the samurai look and not end up with an out of the box square cage look like an aftermarket diy cage. also keeping close to the body as this is not a show car but for real beating on the trail, and needing tight clearance

another shot of the B pilar and tubes running to the stinger protecting the front fenders, and a fancy top view (you have gotta step back and admire the work every now and then)

As promised these are the tie ins to the frame from the sliders i wanted as many tie ins as possible for strenth, these were tricky thanks to scott once again for coming up with a genious idea for strenth and clearance, these took  about 2 hours each to make

heres the rear bumper same as the front with 2"x 4" .120 wall squrae tube and reciver hitch, plated inside and out.

And a mock up of the spare tire carrier

The rear stinger (also very dramatic) doubles as a spare tire carrier, much smaller than the front at 28" in lenth and not protruding nearly as much.

Notice my 35" tire is actually wider than my new comp cut rear

I struggled with making a four seater as i knew i would be doing some very wild obstacles with this rig, and with my children so young they would not be able to ride much, I do trail rides with my uncle and cousin both uroc and werock competitors so the bar is up there for me my family is very competitve and i try to go everywhere they go in there comp rigs, but with all the work on the comp cut making sure the seats would still fit i figured i could always remove them later, so we mocked the rear cage in, really changing the look of the sami.

heres the finished view of the spreaders on top, some addition to the front structure for mor strenth, and a shot of the cage removed to  complete welding and add gussets wich will be made of 1" .120 wall DOM

heres the cage completed and in primer 3 coats of heavy duty primer made for raw steel.
followed up with 4 coats of heavy duty gloss black

And the final pics! Now these are creepy it looks so good almost fake like photoshoped on there, Since this build i have made alot of changes moving to southern utah with much diffrent terrain i have had to stretch the wheelbase to 98" i traded the toyota axles in and now i run full width 44's 80" wide. just finishing up installing a customized long arm tj k link front end with tj coils, and removing the entire front clip fenders and radiator support, this is an ongoing build and ill keep adding to this thread wich ive been wanting to do for some time with eric's incentive for a prize i finally sat dow for 2 hours and put this together. I hope you all like it and feel free to ask questions, I love to help fellow zukers.