My take on a drawer system build. 3rd Gen Drawers

Where to start?

Last time I went camping I was out of space in the bed. I keep my spare tire in the bed for weight distribution purposes, I have no interest in a swingout, so that's been largely the cause for my lack of space. But regardless, carrying 5-6 totes in the bed was not ideal, so I wanted to build out some drawers to keep things organized.

I wanted it taller than the wheel wells, but not to cover the 12v panel I have on the side of the bed. The Decked system looks good, but the rollers take up a ton of room, the drawers don't slide all the way out, and it's about an inch taller than I can fit unless I start cutting on it.

I wanted two equal sized drawers, nearly full length slides, and I wanted to mount my spare horizontal (Currently mounted on the bed rail vertically so it kills my view out of the rear view mirror) again, and wanted enough room to mount a fridge slide. Needed it to be removeable with no drilling or cutting of the bed.

I'm not a woodworker, I've done a few home DIY things, but nothing like this. With that in mind, I didn't want to build it myself. I'd rather pay someone the money I'd spend in tools so I wouldn't have yet another project on my plate. Nobody wanted the work, or they couldn't build it out as nice as I wanted. I needed this to nearly look professionally built (think Goose Gear).

After racking my brain over locking slide options, I settled on a pair of 48" black powdercoated slides from Ovis. They were a hair over $500 shipped. OUCH.

There are some cheaper options on Amazon for half the price, but with the design of locking slides, once they are installed - if they ever fail you are basically rendered with a useless set of drawers. The reviews are also iffy.

Next up is the wood. I wanted it all to be near cabinet grade, so that meant 3/4" cabinet grade birch plywood for the majority of the structure. Heavy and expensive, $80/sheet and I used 5 sheets. For the top sheet, I used two sheets of half inch cabinet grade birch, $60/sheet. I have some miscellaneous hardware, like drawer pulls, tons of screws, 2 quarts of poly, 6 quarts of raptor liner. The poly was to finish the inside of the drawer box, the inside of the drawers, and raptor line everything that would be touched by the elements as it creates a waterproof surface. I have some tool costs as well, Jig saw $50, couple of hole saws $50, Kreg Accu-Cut jig $180, etc etc. I probably have close or over $1500 in this, so it came out right as the same price as the Decked system. Not counting my 30-40 hours in this.

Using a circular saw with a 60t finishing blade, and a Kreg Accu-Cut jig, I was able to get my rough design knocked out quickly and the plywood broken down into manageable chunks. It's nearly impossible to move full sheets of 3/4" yourself, and once assembly started, I needed to wait for a few days for help moving things so progress was slow.

The drawers were probably the toughest to build as I didn't know much about the tolerances of locking drawer slides. Too tight and you can't push the drawers in, too loose and the locks won't engage. Basically had to redo them 3x to get the fitment perfect.

Finished result is about 200-210lbs, the same as the decked system, and looks pretty good.

Onto the pics:

 

Nicely done OP! That really looks great. Question: how are you securing the spare tire? I'm interested in doing something like this in the future...

 

Looks nice man!

 

You don't really need to secure it, it might move around an inch or so max if you're really beating on the truck but it's not an issue.

I just spent the weekend at the beach where I was going over 40mph through some really bumpy stuff, ass out of the seat stuff. The spare moved a half inch.

BUT WAIT...

The box that houses the drawers is 3/4" all around. There is a half inch top sheet as well. You can lag bolt a D ring clamp anywhere you see fit, and hook up a simple 1" ratchet strap. I'll run mine from the factory passenger side tie down point in the bed, and mount the D-ring wherever it's mostly over the center of the tire. You're not really strapping the spare down to the drawer system, just making the strap tight enough to prevent any movement.

 

Nice work - I'll show this to my wife she's always in the mood for building something like that. Right now she's in the
garage building out some custom patio furniture that will fit the two of us perfect.

 

Thank you, sir. That makes sense to me as well.

 

did you secure it to the cab side? or will the strap things near the tailgate be enough to keep the drawer from tipping when it is fully extended?

 

With the spare tire up there it's plenty. But, I'm going to bolt some L brackets that I will make from the front bed rail into the top sheet.

The drawer box is one piece, and the top sheet is actually a second piece, it does not move what so ever as the top sheet is cut to fit the bed almost exactly. It will tip without the spare tire near the cab and with 200lbs in the drawers but without the top sheet. Top sheet does not let it move.

I mainly want to put the L brackets to prevent any micro movement from scratching up the bed. I did put felt tape on all the surfaces that touch. OCD x 100

 

I made the exact same thing years ago for my 1990 Dakota.

 

Man, your drawer system turned out super nice!!

 

Man that looks amazing and i'm Jealous to say the least!

 

One of the best DIY builds I've seen. Nice job!

 

This is incredible craftsmanship. Really something to aspire to.

 

OP, what an amazing build! I have pretty much drawn out the exact same design for myself with a couple minor differences. Question for you. How much taller than the wheel well did you make you top sheet? How deep are your drawers vertically?

 

The top plate was about 2" taller than the wheel wells. I had some very specific sizes so I absolutely had to build them myself. I have an electrical panel on the drivers side and needed the top plate to be under that. But the drawers had to be deep enough to fit my 5gallon propane tank laying on its side. I did a few dry fits with everything to make sure all my gear would fit. I did not draw or sketch anything out, so I don't have dimensions saved. I just ripped some of the 3/4" plywood in 2" strips to act as supports to the top sheet on top of the wheel wells. The half inch top sheet I used was designed to be a wear item and re-made if necessary. Main reason for the supports were for the spare tire side.

I no longer have the drawers as I didn't find myself using them as much as I wanted compared with the weight they added. So I pulled them out, sold them, and used my "weight savings" to add a DRT swingout bumper.

The truck felt a little neutered with the drawers, and the spare tire back there. Spare was too heavy to easily move in and out of that arrangement. Drawers prevented really carrying a lot.

I used a gear plate, and some Milwaukee packout boxes on quick disconnect slides. Used some L track as well. In this configuration, I can have the bed nearly totally empty in 5-10 minutes if I need to carry something.

The packout boxes fit almost as much as the drawers, but they are not as convenient that's for sure. I use the L-track to strap my fridge down (Iceco 45quart). I added some extra holes and tnuts for accessories (Dometic water jug, jack mount, etc) so those things can be pulled easily as well.

 

Very nice craftsmanship, kudos.

I build pro sound speakers and find that weight-reducing construction techniques are quite valuable.
210 pounds of wood for drawers is 210 pounds less payload you can carry in goods and materials.

Swiss-cheesing your solid panels is labor intensive, but only done once during construction.
The reduced weight benefits last as long as you have the drawers.

 

This is awesome! Thanks for also sharing why you took it out. I've struggled with the idea of buying/making a drawer system over the years because I'm not sure how much I would use it to justify sacrificing being able to use the empty bed for anything, anytime. I'm curious though and maybe you wrote it and I missed it... what did you use for the paint finish?