DIY bed stiffeners with bed frame

Soooo... after my attempt to figure out how to mount the 4Runner roof rails I bought to mount to my topper, which stumped me enough to where I put that on pause, I got to thinking.

I still had a piece of metal bed frame laying around from a previous project. Watched the Caliraised bed stiffener video just to see how these things were attached and did some quick Google searching to see various designs.

With my trusty Harbor Freight wire feed welder, a grinder, a tape measure and I Sharpie I got to work!

I’ve got very little welding experience just as a heads up. These aren’t finished as the sun was going down and I was just getting tired from the day’s activities.

Here is what I’ve gotten done. Using .035 Lincoln wire on Max/6 speed on the HF special.

 

That actually looks pretty great for the HF welder. If you ever upgrade you’ll be pleasantly surprised! I would round off those corners at some point so you don’t ever accidentally hurt yourself.

 

Ya, planning on rounding corners and maybe cutting some of the extra sides down a bit. I was surprised as well with the HF welder, the Lincoln wire definitely helps clean it up a bit. For $80 bucks though... the welder isn’t too shabby.

 

I built my own bed stiffeners from angle iron. I rounded off the corners and drilled some 1/2” holes to use for tie down points and to give them a little more detail

 

Looks great, guys -
@Bdiddy11 - a welder only runs 80 bucks? Am I reading that right?

 

Looks pretty good. I had made a comment on another thread that all you needed was a piece of flat stock cut and drilled appropriately. A very small gusset at the angle is all that should be needed. You're not really putting all that much stress on the right angle.

 

Harbor Freight has this coupled with their 20% off coupon gets you there.

Dave