Bed rail plastic

2012 tacoma. I was wondering about taking the top plastic off the bed rails and painting with some type of bed liner has anyone done this on their trucks. Thanks.

 

If you take those rails off . There’s a bunch of holes and slots that are cut into the bed rail. You would have to fill them in. You can easily pop them off and look. I had to remove one of mine when I installed a new tonneau cover and couldn’t get the bolt out

 

Tacoma2ndgen is correct. I had to remove the covers when I installed bed rails.

 

These are available: https://www.kbvoodoo.com/tacoma-caps

 

Seems to me that you could apply the bed liner to the plastic rail tops as well. I think it would look good.

 

If you're talking remove the plastic top and painting those, yes. I did it on mine. It's pretty simple. They just pop off.

 

Anyone have some opinions on theses? They look pretty nice.

 

Use BLAK on Amazon, mine looks brand new! Very highly rec it. Hawaii Tesla detailing has some good videos on it if you're curious, but I can't recommend it enough for uv protection/restoring the black

 

been running them
I guess they work
Was nice with a bare bed or Softopper

Don’t know if they made mounting my camper shell better or worse. Im sure a big part of the struggle I had clearing the tailgate top is my whole bed is probably shifted and might be fixable by loosening the torx screws to adjust it

 

I've been running the KB Voodoo bed caps on my 2015 DC TRD for a few years now. They're fine -- they fit OK and are probably more than strong enough. They're powder-coated, so scratch through to raw aluminum, compared to the through-color of the original polymer caps. The original caps protect more of the bed rail as they cover all the way to the outer edge, whereas the KB Voodoo caps leave some of the outer surface exposed. If I didn't have a special case for using them they wouldn't be on my truck. They just don't add anything otherwise.

In my case they were used to make the bed sides just about the same level as the front rail and the tailgate. That height difference on the Gen 2s is an idiotic design error, IMO. The KB Voodoo bed side caps mounted up fine and have done exactly what I want. They go behind the C-channel rails and have double-stick tape to hold them down to the top of the bed rail.

I modded the uncommon aluminum checkerplate Mountain Top tonneau from my Gen 1 (from that Danish company when it had US production for a few years in the mid 2000s). I'm running an ARE canopy on the Gen 1 now but love that tonneau. I really wanted it on my Gen 2, and eventually figured out a way to mount it. The inside dimensions of the two generation's beds are close enough that it fit. But it needed a level deck, and that's where the KB Vooddoo caps made the whole project possible.

Here are some images of the bed tops without the plastic, the KB Voodoo rail caps, and the finished Mountain Top tonneau in place.