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Rear Bed Anchors

Posted: September 11th, 2014, 12:21 pm
by Peaky
I've had to send my truck into a fabricators today for strengthening of my rear bed anchor points.
After my 2 week tour of the Outer Hebs, I found that the rear anchors had started to rip the seams apart on the bed.
This was due to them only being bolted through the bed with a small 2" square spreader plate to each side.
The fab guy is now going to knock the seems back together & re-seal the joints. He is then going to weld brackets from the chassis & replace the existing eye bolts with longer M12 threaded bars.
I suspect this has been caused by the small single track bumpy back roads & the 'porposing' effect.
So hence why no exploring for the last month :(

Should be out in a couple of weeks with a bit of luck, but first a quick week in Portugal with wifey & some friends. Then a week of work in UK, then a few days work in Germany. Then home for a week before we had off up to the Isle of Mull for the annual Mull Rally.

So not sure when the camper is going to get out :(

Re: Rear Bed Anchors

Posted: September 11th, 2014, 8:59 pm
by zildjian
American groups would almost certainly "Told you so" with their fondness of the 'quick guns' and steel work below trucks chassis,
thing Is I can entirely see their point if you plan on spending time on un-paved roads as a couple of you seemingly do.

wonder if it might be worth looking just how involved a square tube as a belly bar and clamp down off the front leg fixing points
(like I do anyway)
On the navara for example I could strap down off rear camper hook points onto the towbar ignoring the bed altogether

Re: Rear Bed Anchors

Posted: September 11th, 2014, 9:57 pm
by richc
Not happy with the way mine seems to be mounted , it just uses the loops in the back of the pickup

I can see them failing on bumpy roads , Apollo have already said they wern't happy with this and will sort out the proper way when we collect the camper , should be interesting

Rich

Re: Rear Bed Anchors

Posted: September 11th, 2014, 10:02 pm
by zildjian
If you mean the little welded hoops then no,
eyebolt in each corner with a BIG washer beneath seems popular and enough for us casual campers,

for what your planning those aren't enough alone no.

Re: Rear Bed Anchors

Posted: September 12th, 2014, 7:24 am
by keeflester
Slightly o/t
I'm still using the "buttons" that Niche Marketing fitted low down on the outside of the pickup body on my ranger. These always worked for the big heavy Northstar I used to own. The tie downs supplied had a hefty spring inside to reduce shock loading and there don't seem to have been any distortion or cracking in the pickup body. I regularly drive forest tracks and live down the long and winding third world roads of Kintyre.

Re: Rear Bed Anchors

Posted: September 12th, 2014, 8:42 am
by Mike
To fix the back of my ranger to the navarra I use ratchet straps one onto the tow bar mount frame the other onto the tow hoop which seems a good strong point might even put s tow hoop on the other side ad there are holes there I guess for LHD models.
On the front just straps to the buck eye bolts fixed at the top on the bed sides. They dont seem that substantial but so far cant see any signs of stress. May whip them out and add s big washer. Definitely mounting seems not an exact science

Re: Rear Bed Anchors

Posted: September 12th, 2014, 8:55 am
by rubberrat
I had a similar problem with the lashing eyes on my truck. I wrote a short article on 'the other' demountable site which I'll replicate here when we are sure of the format.
But to paraphrase, the bucks on pickups are not deigned to accommodate the unintentional vertical forces they are subjected to caused by the lever action of the high demountable and can cause stress fractures. I'm sure the external 'button' fixing the Niche Marketing fit has similar issues.

As yours Andy, the 60mm plate wasn't man enough and was starting to pull up through the bed steel.
(BTW - I thought we discussed not mentioning 'porpoising' on these forums... there are 'special' places for that! ;) )

I had the buck (side) mounting brackets reinforced (the fitting just in front of the rear wheel) to ensure the buck could take upward vertical forces.

The ✖ bracing bar (under the load floor crossing laterally about 150mm back from the bulkhead) re-welded as a couple of the plug welds showed cracking.

And finally had a super big 250mm x 120mm plate fitted on the rear eyes to act as a spreader with a strengthening longitudinal fold. (Front lashing eyes still using the small 60 x 60 square 'washers'- seems OK so far but will also get the super spreader treatment if any deformation occurs.)

So far... no more problems, but then again I haven't been on Greek roads since!

Image

This is the cause of the problem (physics) the upward vertical force is the culprit



Image

M12 Stainless eye bolts - originally both top and bottom spreader plates were this size, but that wasn't enough, so the underside has been beefed up.



Image

Refabricated Buck Mount to deal with some stress fractures appearing here.




Image

The super sized spreader plate on rear eyes, originals were 60mm x 60mm - these are 200mm x 100mm with a fold to give even more strength




Image

This is what caused my problems



Richc - did you say that you are tying down to the original truck factory fitted lashing eyes? that's a huge no-no and may very well end in tears. Apologies if i have mis-read that in my usual hurry.

* Some of the photos here are being resized to fit the forum picture format, look later if still too big to see the important bits *

Re: Rear Bed Anchors

Posted: September 12th, 2014, 8:06 pm
by Peaky
I got the truck back today, the fab guy said that he couldn't believe what had been done.
He's fabricated an angle iron bracket from the chassis directly to the underside of the bed & tapped the bed back to it's proper position.
He said that the bed had buckled approx 35mm.

Anyway it's all done now, so we're back to normal.
Just need some spare time to use it now, as my diary is just manic at the moment :(

Image

Re: Rear Bed Anchors

Posted: September 13th, 2014, 7:29 pm
by zildjian
Well that.....
would definitely do.
I'm firmly the belief eye bolt & tub=good, Chassis-better

will this fitting be repeated all around, or just there?



edited to add: think I'll show that to my garage man see if he can do the same

Re: Rear Bed Anchors

Posted: September 13th, 2014, 7:58 pm
by Peaky
I'm just going to leave it at that for now, as the front anchor points are bolted straight through to the ✖ member which is attached to the chassis already. My fab guy is an old teenage mate who has his own workshop repairing & modifying Landrovers for enthusiasts in competition use etc. He's used to installing roll cages in competition vehicles. So he's more than capable of producing the desired result ;)