aczlan
Good Morning!
We have a 2002 extended cab, short bed F350 for my inlaws farm. This thread is for upgrades/changes that I will do to it.
First up (sometime this winter) is replacing the rusty box with a flatbed. P
I picked up a couple year old Aluma brand 7x7 flatbed this summer, the previous owner had 4 U bolts holding it to the frame of his truck, but they had all worked loose (but were rusted in place, so we had to cut them off to remove it from his truck).
A friend has the same flatbed and almost the same truck (a couple years newer with the 6.0L diesel) and on his truck, the PO welded 4 pieces of 1.5" angle to the outside of his frame, them put bolts through that and into the frame of the flatbed.
Not sure I like that any better than the U bolts and I don't want to run into issues with cracking like Dethmachinefab found on the truck from Grendel:
Aaron Z
First up (sometime this winter) is replacing the rusty box with a flatbed. P
I picked up a couple year old Aluma brand 7x7 flatbed this summer, the previous owner had 4 U bolts holding it to the frame of his truck, but they had all worked loose (but were rusted in place, so we had to cut them off to remove it from his truck).
A friend has the same flatbed and almost the same truck (a couple years newer with the 6.0L diesel) and on his truck, the PO welded 4 pieces of 1.5" angle to the outside of his frame, them put bolts through that and into the frame of the flatbed.
Not sure I like that any better than the U bolts and I don't want to run into issues with cracking like Dethmachinefab found on the truck from Grendel:
Anyone have any suggestions?Well see. Lots of cracked stuff, aluminum body's need to be fabricated different. They can't handle the fatigue from flexing like steel. When I would build aluminum racks and body's I used alot of bolted connections and big brackets with plug welds.
Aaron Z