Removed the cancer

I noticed this spot under the bed liner a year ago. I thought about cutting it out then but I sprayed some rust control on it and put the bedliner back in and hoped for the best. Well, I pulled the bed liner the other day and discovered that the cancer had worsned. I decided to remove it today. I used an angle grinder with a cut off wheel and an oscillating tool to make the cuts. I plan to fab a piece of sheet metal and weld it back in. Looks like 19 or 20ga steel. This is a very clean 2000 Tacoma that's been in TN and AL it's whole live. Frame appears rust free.

 

Nice job. Got it before it metastasized. Gonna weld another piece on?

 

Yep, gonna fab a piece and weld it in. I've been wanting to do a spray in bed liner but couldn't make peace with this rust location and kept putting it off.

My wife had basil cell and squamous cancer above her eye 4 years ago and I used the same mentality the surgeon did....remove past the cancer.

 

I took my bed liner out and LineXed a few weeks ago. My bed was still good.

Glad you caught that, your truck looks great otherwise...

-Mike

 

They all will eventually rust in these same spots. If you look under the bed were these two seams are joined Toyota did not use enough seam sealer so they start rotting from the bottom.

 

@Itchyfeet

I think I can agree from what was under the bedliner when I bought my 95...you mean like this

 

Yea, plastic drop in bed liners are not a smart idea.

 

Been meaning to pull mine out for years now. Well, no better time than now...

Edit: How did you get the liner out? I see that there are some "clips" holding it in. How do you remove those w/o cutting them? Also how did you dispose of your bed liner?

 

I had a rust issue in the exact same spot as yours. Welded a patch on last summer.

My Toyota Liner doesn't have any clips. It just pops out.

 

If you have the clips like mine did, you loosen the screws and they will rotate out of the way. After it was out took the saw-zall to it and made the pieces small enough to fit in the trash bin.

 

If I remember right, you have to pull against the hidden plastic clips while you unscrew the fasteners, or they will just spin around. My ‘93 pickup and my ‘03 Tacoma both had them installed by previous owners. They sold fast on Craigslist, people still like those dumb things. The OEM plastic bed liner kit is the same part numbers for Tacomas and pre-Tacoma pickups.

 

Nice job, makes me appreciate my composite bed!

 

did patch my bed too. It did rust in the exact same spot



it also had a smaller hole towards the cab (see it on the pic), I did turn it into a drain hole

anyway, the thing with plastic bedliners is that you have to regularly remove it to clean underneath it (and do some paint touch-ups), otherwise the bed floor will rust

 

@onakat that turned out real nice.

I repaired mine by attaching some thin aluminum coil stock material from the underside then using a fiberglass compound. I just rough finished and painted it since I had planned on running a bedliner again anyway. If I hadn't planned on covering mine with the liner, I'd have went with metal as you did.

I used metal on both sides of the outer part of the bed. I'm an ama tuer on body work, but Harbor Freight sells a crimping tool that makes a small step down "ledge" to insert new panels on and it reduces the amt of body filler to cover the tack welding.

 

Do your clips look like this?



I got some of mine out without breaking them, and I also ordered a new set from
Amazon for cheap. But I'm not putting my bedliner back in.

Some people like bedliners, I'd give mine away to dispose of it...

-Mike

 

Thank you.

If that is true, then a spray in liner won't necessarily prevent the rust.

Thank you. Paint is original(except front bumper and grill). There are plenty of paint chips on the hood that I keep touched up. Paint was a bit tired when I bought the truck a year and a half ago. Here you can see truck before I did anything. https://www.tacomaworld.com/threads/2000-4wd-ex-cab.519490/

 

Wow, my rust is definitely minor compared to others.

 

So, thats what they look like on the inside. I believe those are them judging from the back part. Looks easy enough now that i see how they work. I could never get one off, and I didn't want to break one.

 

Mine look different. Mine look like a nut with a tab on it. The tab keeps the nut from rotating.

 

Bought a piece of 19ga metal from McMaster Carr. Cut it a little oversized and started bending. First try was decent but the rib height was off too much. Here's the 2nd attempt after I trimmed it to fit. Gotta weld it in next, and try not to burn a hole through it. LOL.