Straightening a bent tail gate, ideas?

My tailgate is bent outward (so when down it has a slight banana shape to it) from a friend overzealously loading a round of firewood, it's never bothered me too much, but I just got a conopy and with the canopy on it causes it to not seal quite right. Any ideas to fix it? My thought was maybe take the plastic off, hook a come along to one or several of the ribs, and gently try to pull it forward hooked to one of the front cargo points, seems like a slow gentle way to try to pull it forward. Thoughts?

 

It's a little difficult to repair damage like that. You're better off buying a used tailgate or a new one off eBay (think eBay is like $100)

 

$100 for a new one that is color matched? Or would that be jusy a base primer color? Don't really want to spend a ton of money on something that small

 

Just primer. Cheap one from China.

I'm not an expert at body repair but all I can thing off is taking a board or something and evenly applying pressure to the tailgate until it's straight.

 

Good idea with putting a board in there. I'll give that a shot

 

go to scrap yard,find a straight tail gate, pop off your tailgate, pop on straight tailgate, leave yours where the straight one was and drive off.

 

Pick n pull lets you do this actually. I had a guy ask me to help him swap hoods and it was free.

 

At least in my area it's next to impossible to find a tacoma in a wrecking yard. Not a bad idea though

 

Same here. When they are around they're stripped to hell. I've yet to see a 4WD or PreRunner yet though - they're all 5 lugs.

 

I asked at the local pick and pull if they had any tacomas of any kind anywhere and she laughed and was like "no and we probably never will, they're too valuable around here"

 

But. It's the same tailgate.

 

What state are you in? They're like Gold here in California.

 

Keywords: Stripped to hell

I actually saw one the other day, but it was in a rear-end crash. Tailgate looked like a ball of foil.

 

Portland Oregon, same here, normal for them to sell for several thousand over KBB. I've had my truck for over a year and 25k miles and I'm confident I could sell it for at least what I paid for it.

 

Ah. You know just the Pacific Northwest in general. My local Toyota scrapper wanted $600 for an A340F w/o the transfer case. I drove to Reno and got the whole thing with transfer case for $450. You just don't really need 4WD in the PNW which is why 4WD trucks are so rare.

 

I've seen like three of em actually come into the yard the whole time I've been working at the shredder yard. sometimes we get 4 runners but your right usually by the time we get em they look like they shoulda came in about 10 years ago.

 

Try car-parts.com. I easily found parts through them. Saved a lot of windshield time from looking in empty yards.

 

I agree car-part is how I found good deals on parts for my 4x4 swap. I found an A340F for only $250.

 

3rd for car-parts. Found decent deal on 2013 Honda Accord Touring LED headlights.

 

I'd try bending it back first. If you screw it up, then get a new one. Talk to someone at a body shop for tips. You never know, it might not be that hard.