Another reason the composite bed sucks.

well, i found a nice black toolbox that fits the bed after selling my old, small chromed one.

all fine and good but the rail against the back wall always bugged me. keeps a box from getting as close as possible to the cab.
if i could get the box flush to the back of the bed, it would still open safely and look that much sharper.
so i figured i'd remove it. my plan was to detach the rail, mock it up to the box, drill five holes in the box to match the rail, and then use the very same bolts that held the rail on to attach the box to the back wall.
(for more security, in addition to how i have it mounted to the sides)

well, first thing i noticed was once the rail starts to come off, the rear wall is as flexible as jello. i got three off.
touching the wall made it shake like a sheet of poster board.
but i figured, heck, a big heavy horizontal box will do a better job of sturdying the wall better than that rail did anyway.

well, i get to rail bolts 4 and 5, on the left. they are factory torqued SO hard, a long ratchet and the proper torque bit do nothing but strip them out.
and you can't reach the nut in the back to loosen it back there because there is no clearance for any tool, and the lip of the back wall is in the way....

so now i'm pissed, putting my rail back on, setting up my box that i will now never be happy with how it looks - always knowing it could have looked better,,
and i have two rail bolts completely stripped to fuck on my back wall.

yeah, i tried nut loosener, did nothing.

any ideas?

 

You dropped the "F" bomb! SWEET! How pissed you must be. I know its not what you wanted but you could find another mounting bracket as still attach it to the front of your tool box. In all honesty, if your tool box was in the way and you had to remove it, well then you'd still have access to the bracket behind the tool box. Its a win win situation. As far as the gap between the back window and the tool box, try mounting something on that end that you could use and need readily available. It sounds like you're very handy.

 

Can you drill out rail screws/nuts?

 

well, i wasn't going to remount the rail on the front of the box- but hey that was a good idea!
i was just going to keep it in the garage with all my other tacoma bits (badges, stock grill, secondary filter) and mount the toolbox to the back wall.

i suppose i could drill those bolts out one day if i had more time. i have no more patience today. the box is on now.

i just can't believe how that back wall relied on the rail for stability, and how wobbly it is without!

 

I have also noticed that the rails they put in the bed are flimsy. Sucks also that when you put a tool box in you lose that much more bed space! Thats with any truck tho! Does anyone know how much the Toyota tool box goes for? I once read 500.00-600.00!

 

well, here's my secret method:
ever wonder what the two small holes on both sides of your bed cleats are?
among other things, they are for mounting/bolting stuff to.

i had bought a kit from lowe's meant to mount a toolbox to a rail system...but could not get it to work with ours.
plastic blocks supposed to attach to the rails and bolt to the box instead of using j hooks or drilling into the bed.
it was at that point i noticed the holes on this kit piece and the holes on the taco cleats were spaced the same and the same size.

so since i had already drilled specific holes into the wings of the tool box at that distance apart, and the toolbox had room on the sides for the cleats to slide under,
i just used the kit-provided long bolts and screwed them into those holes in the cleats. they went in snugly, actually digging their own threading.
with a little foam rubber stripping under where the box edges sit on the bed walls,and the cleats tightened down, it's not going anywhere.
technically, you can loosen the cleats and slide the box a bit if you need to, which is why i wanted to also bolt the toolbox to the back wall using existing holes and hardware from the rail system, to absolutely secure it.
oh well, it works for now!

since i had used two cleats to secure the toolbox, that's why i was tracking down more and luckily HomerJ sold me two so i can have 4 to use again.
i have a 6.5 ft bed, i think, i can lay flat footed in it and have a little room above my head.
it does suck that with a good box i can't load the scooter in the back straight anymore without a bed extender....so there goes another $200

 

yeah they perty high. i wouldnt go with a toyota for that reason. i went with a UWS. those boxes are stout as hell too. ive had several of them on different trucks. they hold up to everything.

 

It doesn't make sense that 2 of the bolts would be torqued to hell and the others weren't. I would guess that they were just bound up from the rail trying to twist and the back wall flexing. If you had gone from the inside out or the outside in I bet they would have come loose.

 

i should have said- those two were tough to begin with, i risked stripping them- which is why i ended up doing the other three first.
by the time i did those three , the other two still wouldn't budge
i couldn't get to them from the back, so i'll have to drill them out sometime.

 

Gotcha. Still strange that they would be in there so tight and the others weren't. Eh...

 

Zombot, i feel your frustration. When installing my tonneau cover I spent 4 hours drilling out the bed rail bolts as they all stripped when i was trying to remove them. Also burned up my flimsy 12volt drill in the process...

 

glad i'm not alone then

 

I don’t know why you wanted to take off the rail in the first place. With the box installed it looks flush. Plus it gives you something solid to tie the back of the box to.

My install has two J hooks on each side plus one bolt on each side at the back.

 

I have a 1/2" to 3/8" adapter for my impact wrench to run all my sockets on for "stubborn" nuts n bolts. I also picked up a torx socket bit for the bed bolts to do my D-rings. I'd recommend the same thing for the rail bolts. I didn't have any problems taking mine off by hand, but the hammer action of an impact wrench helps keep from breaking things.

And keep in mind, the nut on the side is probably molded into the composite. Twisting or drilling it too much could twist the nut out of the molded composite. Just a guess since I don't know what the back looks like, but I've dealt with too many threaded metal pieces molded or glued to plastic material than I care to remember.

 

Notch it with a die grinder/cut-off and use a flat head screwdriver. No reason why you can't get a small stubby box end wrench on the nut if it starts to spin....you don't even have to hold it, it will stop itself on the box lip when turning.

If all else fails, grind the head right off. Easy fix, no need for anxiety on this job.

 

You guys know you can attach your tool box to the tail by taking the end caps off the rail, then slide a nut inside it and slide it down an attach your box. That's how the Toyota box works and I am sure if you take the cap off and measure the inner rail dim. You can find a nut with enough outer dim that it will not spin within the rail and then you can just loosen and slide the box back if you need to.

 

I made my own tool boxes from ammo cans, there are two and I can mount them in different ways with the rails. I mounted them with bolts and wing nuts in the rails, they lock, now, so to remove them would require unlocking them. However they can be removed in a matter of minutes and still have handles to carry them or to tie them down if need be when removed.
These photos were taken when I test fitted them. Now they have locks and are water tight (even high pressure sprayer proof) and I'll eventually paint them, though the redneck/trailer trash look makes them less tempting to prying eyes. The space between has come in handy for long objects that needed extra space.

 

I love this idea and I hope you take it as a complement that I completely want to copy it. I'm as cheap as is possible, and also love buying military surplus, this is absolutely perfect! Can you please tell me what the dimensions of the ammo boxes are (approx)? I can't wait to go to my local surplus store to haggle!

Thanks!

 

Yeah this is pretty bad ass actually, and It seems like its an easy installation with only 4 holes needed to be drilled through each of the ammo cans