Installing Bed Stiffeners - **Pictures**

Picked up some bed stiffeners from local fabricator - Rago Fabrication and decided to do a quick write up on the installation process.

Very easy and quick installation. I would say it took me about an hour to complete - I like to take my time





The two bolts that need to be removed to install the stiffeners are located here:



Two different torx are required for the D ring and the Bed bolt. The torx were not found at my local autoparts store, I had to pick them up at Lowes.:





Stiffener were mocked up, per the instructions: Do NOT tighten them. Just start the threads and rattle the stiffeners for a level and square installation.



Once the you are satisfied with the final fitment of the stiffeners, start a pilot hole and drill the three holes for the three bolts on the vertical leg.



Remove stiffeners, drill out hole to required bolt size. I decided to paint over the holes to reduce the possibility of corrosion.





While the paint dries, remove the taillight:







This will allow you to install the bolts in the vertical leg:



Now tighten all five bolts to secure the stiffener and repeat on other side:



Pictures showing how bed mat interferes with stiffener.





Does not bother me at all.

This concludes this writeup.

 

Be still, my heart.

 

You forgot the beer

#modsgonewrong

 

Your words are magic to me

 

I rand out of shiner

 

​

Looks good, welds look mad decent.

 

some legit welds!

 

Damn Ramon. Looks good.
I thought you bought stuff and sold stuff.
Never knew you actually can install stuff.

 

Get out!

 

Are you from around the mountain home area (last i heard this is where rago is based out of)? Or did you mean local as in a texas fabricator? Just curious as im about 30 mins from mountain home and there arent many tw members up this way. Great write up btw GB king!

@ramonortiz55

 

I actually have a Tacoma build thread

 

Lies!​

 

New to the scene here, what's the purpose of this? Do the beds flex too much?

 

Thanks - that looks simple. Does it actually make any notable improvement in bed rigidity?

 

for those that do heavy offroading with a fully loaded bed, yes. These keep the beds square.

 

I haven't placed them to the test yet - but I believe others have confirmed improvement.

 

I would have removed the rock stuck between the bed floor and the passenger side upright before tightening everything up.

 

I need that rock there

 

Understandable

 

I installed the Rago stiffeners on my 3rd gen and it definitely added some rigidity. Did you notice any change in your tailgate/body gap after the install?