I wish your buddy was my buddy too! That sounds awesome.

I wonder how much protection Tone's hitch provides as a bumper? I know the metal hidden bumpers were fairly poor when new, and they tended to rot out. With the winch mount you have the front taken care of, but I am wondering about the protection in the rear?

One other possibility would be to make a hitch receiver for the front, so a winch could easily be moved from front to rear, or even removed when not wheeling.

I'm hoping with a a screen name like VXorado, means you live in Colorado? I'm in Idaho Springs and will need some custom fabrication done soon. Let me know.