My Bed design

[trimster]

Just now, Hot Rod said:

Kinda curious on the choice of aluminum deckplate...  why not steel?  Weight is not an issue tandem, and you could have simply welded it down and saved a lot of work, and you are covering in bedliner anyway.

Weight is an issue but for a different reason. I want to be able to get under the deck to service stuff. The deck is currently comprised of 5 pieces. The 2 full length sides (@ 107 lbs each) and 3 smaller sections down the middle.

I paid a premium to do this. Aluminum is way hard on the budget right now. But I wanted the convenience.  

The weight of steel would have been nice however.

[trimster]

Spent yesterday morning at the fabricators test fitting the under-bed boxes and doing final measurements for the rear boxes.

These are the drivers side boxes which are 25" deep.

Those fit spot on. The longer boxes, one hit a glitch. Or rather, a bit of weld on the frame that hung it up going in. My bad for not cleaning up that opening as I should.

Adam, the fabricator par-excellence, measures for the generator box based on some mounting brackets I fab'd up.

The ramp boxes are 6'3" deep. The ramps are (folded) 6'.

And having the deck plates open up is proving to be worth all the effort. In fact I pulled a center plate to access the problem weld that needed to be ground down. Made it an easy fix.

Because the boxes are built to tight tolerances for the space, the doors, hinges, and latches are a bit of a head-scratcher. We think we have a solution. It would be easier all around if they were to be welded into the bed, but I want them removable so I can pull them and work on truck stuff underneath the bed.

There will be a lip on the boxes that will act as support for the weather stripping and the 4 elevator bolts that will mount them to the opening support steel.

Boxes will be sprayed with a few coats of Por-15. The doors will be power coated gloss black and the latches will be chrome. Looks like 'slam-type' door latches will be the best fit for the ramp boxes. The generator and tool box in the rear will have T-handle style.

 

 

[Chad Heiser]

Very nice!

[BlaineM]

looking good

[trimster]

Finishing up the templates for the bed skirting. Fun exercise. It will be painted the same as the truck when finished. The open space in the rear is where the box for the generator will go.

Oh... and we added another family member. Something for the truck to carry around. Sold the Goldwing. The Spyder is something both of us can drive. I'm guessing that once the wife gets comfortable in the drivers seat...I'll just be watching the view from the back.

 

[Alie&Jim's Carrilite]

5 hours ago, trimster said:

 

The Spyder is something both of us can drive. I'm guessing that once the wife gets comfortable in the drivers seat...I'll just be watching the view from the back.

 

That's the primary reason we did the Smart.  Alie CAN drive the truck, but does so only on open road.  All the city driving, grocery runs, site-seeing was me driving the truck for 4 years.  I make her drive the Smart now so I can look around and see the sights.

[geodog1]

The nicest thing about a Smart  is you con heat and cool the drivers compartment and stay dry when it rains.

 

 

ShortryO

[Star Dreamer]

On 4/25/2021 at 2:40 PM, trimster said:

Finishing up the templates for the bed skirting. Fun exercise. It will be painted the same as the truck when finished. The open space in the rear is where the box for the generator will go.

Oh... and we added another family member. Something for the truck to carry around. Sold the Goldwing. The Spyder is something both of us can drive. I'm guessing that once the wife gets comfortable in the drivers seat...I'll just be watching the view from the back.

 

So does this mean you need 3 ramps now!

[trimster]

26 minutes ago, Star Dreamer said:

So does this mean you need 3 ramps now!

Yup. 2 in the below bed storage, and one will live on the deck.

[noteven]

20 hours ago, geodog1 said:

The nicest thing about a Smart  is you con heat and cool the drivers compartment and stay dry when it rains.

 

 

ShortryO

Which is why they are an appliance and not a motorcycle 🤣

[trimster]

Bit of an update:

With delays in shipping of drawer guides, door hardware... the fabricator is behind on my job. But all is good. Ramp boxes should be done this week. Doors might be a few days out getting power coated.

12' ramps from Discount Ramps are on backorder until July, maybe. That's not a good timeframe. If anyone knows another source for 12' ramps that will carry 1000lbs each, it would be appreciated.

Stuff I have done in the 'between' time:

- run airline from trailer brake line to the back of the bed.

- Finished the wheel chocks

- Winch came in so I finished that build.

- built the #4 wire run from the batteries to the winch and tested. Works fine, just need the ramps so I can test under real load.

Edited May 24, 2021 by trimster

[trimster]

Update:

Getting ready to hit the road on the 15th so crunch time and a ton of FedX frustration.

The under-bed boxes are in. Whew... what an ordeal. Broke far to many drill bits doing the drill-n-tap thing to mount these in. Ya, my bad for doing some tricky drilling with carbide bits. Broke two tips off in two holes. A diamond hole saw bit came to the rescue, cutting out the metal around the broken bit. Took a while, but worked great.

From this....

 

to this....

 

Still need to add the weather gaskets around the doors. So far...working as planned.

And the bigger cabinets are coming along nicely. Hope to install them tomorrow.

Now the FedX drama. Ordered the Big Boy ramps from Discount Ramps. They are great to deal with. Their choice of shipping options... ya, not so much. The ramps arrived in Salt Lake on 1 July. Then 4 times they were loaded into a delivery truck only to be returned to the docks. "barcode unreadable". So the driver can't read the address on the package? Guess that's a lost skill set.

Then the ramp package tracking went into 'exception' ... then disappeared completely for days. Then re-appeared as 'new barcode label created'. Then 2 more 'loaded on truck' and then returned to docs. Now it says 'barcode label unreadable. New barcode created.' It's not the 10th and they can't even seem to deliver them to one of the FedX store fronts. Repeated calls to someone in India gets one nowhere. They really work hard to keep the customer from calling the local distribution station and talking with someone who speaks understandable english. Wonderful customer service.

My expectations are pretty low now that the ramps will be undamaged, it they arrive at all. I'm thinking I need to just drive over to the main shipping center (4 miles) and bang on the door. I really can't create the mount locations for the wheel chocks until the ramps get here. Really frustrating... well, actually way past that right now. So many packages delivered here and to neighbors, totally destroyed. Ya, not going to ship FedX anytime soon.

So that's the latest.

 

[Alie&Jim's Carrilite]

If you have a tracking number, go to the fed docks and walk in and they can find them.  I had to do this in Chicago....

 

[trimster]

Just now, Alie&Jim's Carrilite said:

If you have a tracking number, go to the fed docks and walk in and they can find them.  I had to do this in Chicago....

 

Yup. That's what I did. Box looked like hell. Some minor damage to the ramps.  Nothing i can't live with.

Now figuring out where they need to set so the CanAm goes up properly.  2 test runs got it close. Wrenching it up backwards. Aligning front wheel ramps shown here.

[Darryl&Rita]

11 minutes ago, trimster said:

Some minor damage to the ramps. 

Touch base with Discount Ramps. We got a discount when ours showed up bent.

[trimster]

Road trip starts tomorrow . Shake down test. Final boxes installed. Lots of little things to do to finish, but road worthy as is.

 

 

[dblr]

Looks great!!!!!!!!! I have enjoyed following along, thanks for sharing.

[Brad & Jacolyn]

Beautiful job. Now enjoy.

[Danandfreda]

Saw this truck last night at happy hour. Looks better in person. Great job!

[trimster]

Thanks.  Kind words. Good to see everyone at the rally.

[trimster]

Some thoughts on road-abiliy of bins, latches, and doors.

- slam latches Must be slammed shut to stay closed plus locked. Twice I've stopped to find a ramp bin door open.

Rear bins, because they are behind the axles, scramble anything inside. Tools are everywhere. Need tool-rolls. Generator needs too be strapped down to the slide-out tray.

Otherwise, loving the configuration. 

 

[trimster]

Just got back from nearly 2 months on the road. Shakedown for the bed and boxes. 

Everything stayed on the truck. Nice thing. However the boxes behind the drives get the hell shaken out of them. The tools side is a scrambled mess. I bought those multi-pouch rolls for tools and put lots of them in that. That really helps.

The generator side... I'm just blown away. The geny weighs in at 90#. I have it held down with two trucker bungie straps and it still moves/jumps all over.

We were launched full seat extension in the cab several times on those bridge sections from the road to the bridge and off.

Maybe ratchet strap this baby in? I hesitate to bolt it in. I like being able to get it out when needed without much work.

Otherwise, all went well with the bed. Next up is getting the skirting water-jet cut, installed and painted.

 

[Steve from SoCal]

Regarding your generator,

A ratchet strap or better yet a metal strap, nothing with any elasticity.     In a trucking forum several guys have used plywood on the bottom of boxes to keep them from busting thru.     As you have seen the frame mounted boxes are subject to high G force both negative and positive.     Is fuel leaking out of the generator?   

 

 

 

     

[trimster]

8 hours ago, Steve from SoCal said:

.     Is fuel leaking out of the generator?   

 

 

 

     

No fuel leak.

I'd thought about getting the vibration isolation mounts. They have studs on both sides. Replace the feet with those. Screw them into the feet mount holes and then to the rollout tray. Makes quick removal not so quick, but might hold it in place PLUS reduce vibration transmitted to the cabinet itself. Then again, these could just get ripped appart. 

[trimster]

Got the aux gas tank installed for the generator.

It's a 7 gal. universal tank for generators.

Fuel line connects to the tank drain and feeds a fill valve.

Under the tank, which sits above the generator box, is high density foam which will help support the tank when full. This should take a load off the corners where the tank is mounted. 

There will be a locking diamond plate door over the tank filling one of the two remaining openings in the bed.