BUYER BEWARE: 3rd Gen Plug-N-Play Tailgate Bolt-N-Lock & Tailgate Bolt-N-Open

Working on my install. Got everything mounted in the tailgate, harness ran into the cab. I got the wiring to the passenger kick panel, and I’m about 8” short. Gonna solder some extra wire in there to make it Reach. Maybe I chose the wrong route to the cab grommet

 

Hmm. Don't like hearing that. Did you check in the tailgate area? Is there extra harness left in there by chance? I know each wire loom is 14' and then with the 8" between the tailgate and rear bumper and the extra additions and then the extra foot or so on the one end, it all should equal roughly 16'. On my truck and a few others that were short beds, when doing the routing on the instruction sheet, I had an extra 2' on the end that I cut off and re-clamped. Let me know what you find out regarding inside the tailgate. Sorry to hear about this man! My apologize

 

No slack, I double and triple checked the tailgate and made sure I wasn’t kinked up going under the bed and getting to the frame rail. I also have a short bed, so I’m not sure why it would have came up short. No worries though, it’s an easy fix!

 

Wow. I am so sorry. I was going to say next that I am more than willing to send you another harness if you would like me to do that :/

 

It’s all good! No way I would wanna pull that whole harness back out for 8” of wire, ha.
Solid kit, thanks for your hard work and willingness to replace!

Tried uploading a video, but can’t do it from my phone. It works great!

 

I'm glad you like it! Whenever you figure out how to upload that video, I'd love to see it

 

Thank you @KTJO 4x4
And thank you mail man
Ready for the weekend

 

YAY!!!

 

Ordered and paid!
Got in before the 300. Thanks for your hard work @KTJO 4x4 !

 

All back together. Works great! Thanks Katie!

 

Just wondering, were the harness only, suppose to come with female bullet connectors?

 

Just in case anyone makes the same mistake as I did. If you snap the rod between the actuator and the lock while bending it. A metal coat hanger should be close if not the same diameter. It worked for me and saved me having to run out and find a replacement.

 

After watching the tracking go from Oregon to Cali then all the way back past Oregon to Vancouver Canada, my package arrived today. Thanks Katie. Now some work to be done on my truck.

 

Will be ordering on payday...

 

PNP Harness Only

 

Thank you,
I went and bought from homedepot.

 

@KTJO 4x4 ,
I don’t see my name on the list. Did you get my PayPal payment yesterday? I pm’d you because I forgot to include my TW username with the PayPal payment.

 

Hi.....i just experimented today with a square tube....1" and then ¾"......I put a ¼" foam strip on the top and bottom of each......drilled mounting holes in tail gate and both tubes......i mounted from the back (cab) and found that with the 1" tube, i was hitting the raised part of the indented Tacoma name where it sinks into the tailgate......so i changed to try ¾" tube....mounted from the back again and it worked fine.....

in order for me to get everything mounted, i twisted the tube so i could put my finger in to hold the lock washer and nut......when that was done, i turned the tube so it faced the handle on the tailgate......put the other screw with flat washer and star washer and nut in and tightened everything up.....

when i saw that I could mount the tube that way, i took it off and mounted the actuator to the tube using 6-32 1-¾" screws with flat washers and star washers and nuts......then i re-mounted the tube to the tailgate again the same way as above and tightened up all bolts and nuts.....i used 10-24 ¾" machine screws and nuts with star washers for the tube mount to the tailgate

i have ¼" foam between the tube and tail gate...... and ¼" foam between the tube and actuator.......this i hope will take out some of the noise when it operates......

i too am going to use a ring connector.....my set up, because of the 2 pieces of ¼" foam, has got me level and straight across from the lock post......i tried to get the eyelet on the actuator to fit on the lock post but it was too small....i opened the eyelet up to see it i could mount directly.....i did not like this set up so i am going to solder a ring connector on the rod and slide it through the eyelet and put the ring of the lock post......because i opened up the eyelet, i will be using a 3/16" flat washer on so the rod won't go thru it....

i will be running harness tomorrow and plug in the small harness.....then connect cable connectors in cab and tailgate and test out the fob to see if it works......

i also drilled holes in the camera clips to push the harness thru.....that will take out having to pinch the cable by putting harness on the side of the clips: it was really hard to push it back into place and i did not want to risk damaging the harness.....it did have enough room though, but it was tight....

i will take pictures tomorrow of the actuator and post ......harness is really basic and goes from front to rear......thats is the easiest part of the whole project......

oh well, just thought i was share with you my mounting project and thank you for your ideas

take care

edit: 28 Mar 19 1433

well this morning I completed the install and wiring run......i was able to get harness thru the holes i cut into the clips and get the clips back into the holes with no problem.....looks good....sorry, did not take pix of that.....

now i started running the harness under the truck....i kept it high and followed the frame.....when i got to the muffler, i went high long a white cable all the way up to the grommet under the passenger seat.....punched hole and started pushing harness in.....i almost had a heart attack because it looked very much like i was going to be about 15" short!!......as i kept pulling into the cab, i was unable to go under all three standoff under the plate......i ran directly to the 2nd one and into the 3rd and ran up to the PnP harness pigtails.....i connected the bullet connectors and had only about 1.5" of staring relief......now, i have a 2016 DC long bed......i was looking for about 12" of extra but it worked for me.....it looks just like OEM because not a whole lot of extra wire......after that, i went to the back and started looking at the rod install....

the rod was a different issue....at first i was going to put on the ring connector but it rotated some and the side was making contact with the metal lock mount.....so i decided to just use the rod directly to the black handle mount......i drill a 1/16" pilot hole and then enlarged it to ⅛".....i looked at the throw of the rod and measured it in the locked position and the opened position......because the handle black piece moved in a radius pattern, I had to enlarge the hole with a small amount of curve to it.......because the drill spins in clockwise rotation, it slid in the correct direction and made the hole somewhat curved......at that point, i mounted the rod in the eyelet and observed how much i needed to bend at the handle.....i was careful to measure with the handle lock "open" and the actuator fully compressed......

now i was ready to make the bend......i was worried because i did not know if the rod would become brittle with the bend so it had to be right on the first time.....as i would have it, because i wanted the eyelet facing up and the bend down, i went thew wrong way....hahahaha........so i got to test it by bending back 90 degrees.....used vise and went really slow back to where i wanted.....no problem, but I would recommend doing it very slow......i connected rod into eyelet and into the curved hole i made on the handle black plate.....WOW....it worked for my trial run by hand.....then i tried it using my fob.......perfect......the rod moved perfectly in the curved cutout and did not come up at all....

total time for this was about 8.5 hours.....but remember, i had trial and error with the two tubes, changing from ring terminal and rod install, and taking a lot of time just picturing what i wanted to do and just being careful......i think, if i had it to do all over again or help someone, i could do it in about 3 hrs....

one thing i forgot to include last night was, when i used the ¼" foam on the tube and actuator, I put sticky double-side tape under the foam attached to the tube...


here are the pictures of the tube......

It was a fun project......thanks to Katie for providing everything we needed and all the other members for their insights and tips......and especially to those who provided videos.....it made everything so much easier......

 

PM sent for a full kit

Thanks!