If you’re in the GXOR Facebook Group, you’ve almost certainly seen Goliath Offroad’s pics of their GX470 test vehicle tackling impressively tough trails at Wind Rock.
Turns out they also make a wide range of bumpers, skid plates, rock sliders, and a whole lot more for various Toyota, Jeep, Ford, Ineos, and Land Rovers, too. So, I headed to their Factory HQ in Umatilla, Florida, to check out how they do it…
Goliath Offroad Factory Tour
Co-founder Maciej Michalecki (dark gray shirt…yes, they’re twins!) walked us through in the video above. Then we walked back through and kept talking, check out the photos below for more details on how they do what they do, plus a sneak peek at prototype projects they’re working on.
Pay a visit and you’ll see their lobby-slash-merch room. A few of the mounts and parts they make are on display, from a gas growler and high-lift jack mounts to their new 3-Ton Badlands trolley jack mount.
The Badlands 3T jack is a popular item, so they made a cradle specifically for it. Mount it to your rear swing-outs or rack and it’ll keep it safe and secure. It’s zinc-coated, as are many of their external steel mounts and accessories, to prevent rust.
Behind the lobby are a few offices and bathrooms, but the real magic happens in one of three larger sections. The biggest is the central room, where bumpers and other parts are warehoused, prepped, and packed. It’s also where they park vehicles for 3D scanning and test fitting.
They keep stock of their most popular bumpers. This helps them ship faster, but also helps with production efficiencies since they can batch cut, fold, and weld them in groups.
All bumpers are steel and shipped raw. They used to prime and powdercoat, but the shipping companies often scratched the finish, so they now only ship them like this.
The skid plates are cut and bent in house, then have gussets and supports welded to the topside to strengthen them.
Aluminum parts are kept on separate shelves. While they don’t need paint or coatings to protect from corrosion, they do live on soft shipping mats to prevent scratches.
Goliath uses alloy for most of the parts that live under the hood (examples further below in story), since they’re subject to more moisture and dirt. Anything that’s steel that goes outside gets the zinc coating, and smaller parts might get powder coating since they can be packaged and protected more easily than full-size bumpers.
Check out the new rock sliders for the Ineos Grenadier! Unlike the tubular options for most of the other vehicles they cover, these have a boxier construction that looks very high-end.
The Welding Room
Darek, Maciej’s brother, is the welder. Anything Goliath makes that’s got a weld on it passes through his hands on this workstation.
Behind it on the right (red) is their Press Brake, where everything gets bent and formed into shape. On the left is their new laser cutter, which lets them cut all of the metal in house. They used to outsource that, but now they can manufacture 100% in house, only sending parts out for zinc- and powder-coating.
As pieces are cut, they’re stacked and staged for welding. Most of this is parts for a bumper, and they try to shape as many sections of it out of a single piece.
Darek says the fewer welds they have to use, the stronger the part is, so the wings of the bumper may look like a lot of angles and pieces, but they’re often just a single piece on either side of the center section. They say this makes their bumpers much stronger than DIY options that pack and ship flat, leaving the buyer to weld a lot of bits together.
Test Vehicles, Parts & Prototypes
Their latest addition is this Land Cruiser project vehicle. They’ve started scanning it to produce all the things, but usually kick things off with smaller MOLLE panels and interior mounting points. If you’ve got an LC, give them a follow on Insta to see what comes of it.
Their most visible test vehicle is the GX470, which has all of their bumpers, sliders, skids, and mounts.
This rear bumper is a recent addition, complete with side bars and your choice of one, two, or no swing-outs. There are a few clever features worth pointing out on this:
First, the recovery hooks are made in house by welding together three plates. Not only does this let them make them in house from spare metal, it also lets them shape them however they want. It’s hard to argue that this “D” shape looks far more elegant than the standard part everyone else uses, and it actually helps make the part more affordable. All of their recovery points are now chamfered for use with soft shackles.
Second, their swing-out latches are now spring loaded for a more secure closure that won’t pop open if they get knocked by something.
Lastly, the rear bumper comes pre-cut for a Baja Designs S2 rear light. To install, you remove the cover plate from the light and instead use the bumper to seal it. This results in an extremely clean look that also prevents anyone from stealing your light since it’s sandwiched between the bumper and the frame (so, yes, you want to install the lights at the same time as the bumper).
Notice that Panhard bar? Maciej says starting a new suspension brand called Dune Runner, and this is one of the first parts for it. I also spotted heavy duty rear control arm links, Jeep steering rods, and a pile of OEM front control arms that they’d 3D scanned.
One of their newer bits is a transmission cooler mount that makes it easy to add a larger trans cooler without taking up extra space. It’s mounted here behind the horns…can’t even see it!
They also make a universal winch control box relocation mount, and that accessory mount shown behind the fuse box (top left, with the RC unit on it). All of these mounts are aluminum, so they’re easy to drill into if you need to customize it to fit something.
Worth noting: Their new Enduro bumper for the GX470 has impressive front clearance and approach angles, yet still fits a full-size winch. And if you go for something like the new ComeUp Seal Slim RSI winch, it’ll likely fit with no mods or relocations needed.
Project Truck
Over on the other side of the offices is their install bay for larger parts. There’s a full-size lift at the back, and up front was this Dodge Ram 3500 that is being completely customized and refinished.
The rear suspension is full custom with a coil spring conversion. They removed the stock leaf springs and added long trailing-arm lower links. On the passenger side is a third control arm link, and Darek is making a Panhard Bar for it, too.
The 3+1 linkage design allows him to use the factory gas tank and, um, keep it simple…
…if you consider doing a coil swap that involves cutting the frame and custom fabricating notched frame members to create a spring perch “simple”.
Custom lower spring mounts have their signature style. They both told me that several of their personal projects (this is Darek’s truck) end up leading to commercial parts, so if you’ve got a Dodge, follow along.
The bent frame section is just tacked into place for now. They’re quite proud that they were able to create a coil-sprung long-travel design without having to cut into the bed or move the springs too far inboard. Just one of the many benefits of having a well-equipped fabrication shop and knowing how to use it!
The entire truck was stripped down and finished with Raptor Liner, all the way through…there’s not a crack or door jam anywhere on it showing the factory color.
The engine is original, but completely cleaned with a few upgraded parts on it. The front of the frame was cut to make room for a few upgrades, and they’ll be making a high-clearance winch-mount bumper for this.
Darek says eventually, maybe, they’ll put a Ford front axle-and-diff in there, but for now the factory Dodge suspension and drivetrain will do.
Huge thanks to Maciej and Darek for showing us around!
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