Tailgate bending from INSIDE out? Anyone have this problem too?

While looking the other day, I noticed my tailgate was actually bending from the inside-out?

I have no clue how this happened and it keeps showing up in more spaces.

Kind of hard to see in the picture, but it's on the right side near the top and on the bottom where the tailgate bends in. Also starting to show up on the side by the taillight.

Anyone seen this before or had this happen? I have no clue how it could be.

 

You're carrying/loading something while the gate is down and putting pressure on the cup hinges.... this pushes the gate down and when you close the gate, the door is now bumped out proud of the body/tail lights.

 

It probably happened because you actually used your tail gate.
The tail gate on these trucks are weak. I'm betting that if you open up the tail gate you'll see braces where The dents are.
The inside flexed because it is plastic. And the outside dented.

I have dents in my tail gate. I no longer worry about.
As long as it opens and closes all is good.

 

Never loaded anything in the bed of the truck, that's why i'm not sure.
I guess there's no way to fix it either

 

Huh, that's all I can think of for a cause.

 

Pull the plastic panels off the bed side of the tailgate and see if those circled areas line up with the tailgate braces, I'd say if they do, then yes, something heavy flexed the tailgate enough to push those braces and then make a high spot on the tailgate skin.

I can't really tell from the pic, but you can find out in 3 minutes if you have the right size Torx bit.

 

It's been used at bonfires,etc for sitting on.. but I surely hope sitting on it wouldn't do this

 

I'll check it out tomorrow when it's light out. That's crazy though.

 

Could have. The tailgate is extremely weak on that side (the working side). It is mostly unsupported, and for sure if you pushed enough weight on the braces that are glued from the support structure to the exterior tailgate skin (where your dents are), it would definitely be possible for them to do similar damage.

 

That's crazy that it would bend that easy.

 

I just had my plastic pulled off to install the Relentless tailgate piece, I think there are 6 or 8 braces connecting the support structure to the tailgate skin (exterior), and they're fastened with some kind of adhesive, 2 or 3 of mine were no longer attached, like you'd see if you'd taken a razor blade and cut through the middle of the adhesive. The fasteners that attach the plastic pieces are threaded into plastic, and there is little support in the tailgate. The braces are maybe 3" wide at the contact point, so they can potentially put quite a bit of force on a pretty small area of sheet metal. How wide are your dents?

 

I'll have to do that tomorrow and check it out. I'm not sure, they're both maybe 5-6"?

 

If you don't recall loading anything heavy on your tailgate (to include a 300# fat ass friend buddy plopping his ass on your tailgate)? Have you ever had a heavy load in your bed slide around while driving and hit the tailgate?
Either way our tailgates are junk! I too have a relentless tailgate reinforcement plate on mine. Because I use my truck to load all the time, it was actually my first mod!

 

I have a strict no fat chicks policy, so that couldn't be the case
I've loaded bags of mulch, but that is the only thing I can think of.

 

From Xr Underground.
Tailgates are crap, like the frames..

 

There you go, so you can see, if you sit on half of the tailgate, only 2 thin supports are really taking the bulk of the weight, and they're distributing most of it to the brace attached to the tailgate skin.

 

Absolutely.

http://www.tacomaworld.com/forum/2nd-gen-tacomas/344164-weak-tailgate.html


Luckily my PDR guy was able to work mine out almost completely. Then I installed the Relentless Tailgate reinforcement panel to prevent any future issues.

 

Even standing on the tailgate (when it is down); can put enough force on those inside braces to potentially, crease the outer panel.

When you get the inside plastic panel off; you will be amazed at the lack of support the tailgates have.

 

According to the following post, the tailgate only has a capacity of 200 lbs.

One or two people sitting on the tailgate can exceed this capacity.

 

But that post is according to no actual source.

I've had well over 200 lbs on the tailgate, in fact, I weigh 280 lbs and I have stepped onto the tailgate and into the bed without denting or bending anything, That's a lot of weight over an area the size of my boots. I've had 200 lbs of paper supplies on my tailgate as well, in 24x24 boxes and no problems either. The only sign of damage my tailgate has is separating adhesive on the braces that I mentioned above, and I can't say I caused that to happen either.