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Load capacity and strength for aluminum pickup tray-bed ?

Spud

Diamond
Joined
Jan 12, 2006
Location
Brookfield, Wisconsin
I was thinking of swapping my factory 6' 6" Silverado bed on my 2500HD with a used tray-bed, like the ones on Home Depot rental pickups.

I don't know who makes the HD ones but they look mighty similar to the Tafco Scott Aluminum tray-bed
Southern Truck sells rust free GM, Chevrolet, GMC, Chevy, Ford, Dodge, Jeep, Toyota, Mazda, Isuzu, Mitsubishi, Nissan truck parts and also does truck restorations and customized paint jobs.

There are other manufacturers of aluminum tray-beds. Do any of them state the payload capacity of the bed?

What I am wondering is , if I secured a 3300 lb machine to this kind of bed, if the machine might rip the rails of the bed free of the pickup frame if load shifted but this wouldn't be an issue with the factory steel bed ?
 
I was thinking of swapping my factory 6' 6" Silverado bed on my 2500HD with a used tray-bed, like the ones on Home Depot rental pickups.

I don't know who makes the HD ones but they look mighty similar to the Tafco Scott Aluminum tray-bed
Southern Truck sells rust free GM, Chevrolet, GMC, Chevy, Ford, Dodge, Jeep, Toyota, Mazda, Isuzu, Mitsubishi, Nissan truck parts and also does truck restorations and customized paint jobs.

There are other manufacturers of aluminum tray-beds. Do any of them state the payload capacity of the bed?

What I am wondering is , if I secured a 3300 lb machine to this kind of bed, if the machine might rip the rails of the bed free of the pickup frame if load shifted but this wouldn't be an issue with the factory steel bed ?

I don't know if I'd trust the factory anchors for a 3k pound, possibly top heavy load. I'm sure it's been done, but not me señior.
 
i would not be putting 3300 lbs in or on the back of a 2500 pickup. sure rated only 2600lbs, good way to invert the leaf springs. 2600 lb rated is a distributed load.
buy a trailer and put it on that.
 
I would believe that a flatbed (be it still or aluminum) would be as strong as the factory bed. What do you consider a good tie down in a factory bed? A stake pocket? Some cleat that's screwed the inner fender well? It's been years since there were actually heavy tie downs in a factory box.

I would expect the rub rails on any decent flat bed to hold better than the best factory tie down in a stock bed.
 
I wouldn't buy an alum bed for heavy use, and I also probably wouldn't trust 3300 lbs in the back of a 2500. I do love flatbeds though, you should be able to buy any truck and opt out for a flatbed if you want.
 
I would suspect just about any aftermarket flat bed will be better than the factory in regards to holding any load. I would probably opt for a steel bed over aluminum, and add bags to the rear of the truck. You could always run your tie down points through the bed to the frame for anchoring to no?
 
I looked at a few websites. Most don't have a load rating listed. I did find a rating on the link below. They say 200 psf for heavy duty and 350 psf for extra heavy duty. Of course, also depends on truck rating and that rating does not consider hold downs.
 
Here's a used aluminum traybed on Craigslist in California. Looking at those frame rails for the bed, they don't inspire confidence. I don't know what Home Depot's traybed underside looks like but will take a look.

Flatbed - auto parts - by owner - vehicle automotive sale

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I like to have some headroom on my load ratings, just like on tie downs and rigging supplies. I would't want to put a 3,300# high CoG load on a truck that has a load rating of 3,300# - the driver, fuel and any other cargo which would put you over GVWR. I also personally like the redundancy offered by a DRW truck, if you get a flat you aren't immediately on the rim and tilted with that high CoG load.
 
I like to have some headroom on my load ratings, just like on tie downs and rigging supplies. I would't want to put a 3,300# high CoG load on a truck that has a load rating of 3,300# - the driver, fuel and any other cargo which would put you over GVWR. I also personally like the redundancy offered by a DRW truck, if you get a flat you aren't immediately on the rim and tilted with that high CoG load.

I was only thinking of moving the item a short distance, like 15 miles, and just on local roads, no freeway.

The Cincinnati grinder I used to have , which weighed 2400lbs, I picked up in Ohio, which was about 430ish miles. Didn't have any issue with that, and the CoG is a bit high for that T & C grinder. But maybee there is a big difference between 2400lbs and 3300 lbs ? The rear of the truck barely lowered its stock ride height with the grinder , so I presume the G.M. factory payload rating is very conservative ?
 
Those little ally trays ,8ft x6ft are around $250 each at the 4x4 wreckers.....The previous company vehicle I had used to regularly carry a 2ton bulker bag on the ally tray........I just recently unloaded a big gear shaft from an old crane by rolling it off the edge .....And also bashed in the back with the old crane .....no worries,Ill buy another one from the wreckers when I finish cleaning up the scrap.....Low ally scrap price ATM.
 
Pick up truck frames are not the same as cab/chassis. Pick up frame would make the tray mount bed much higher on the truck making the load higher CG or top heavy. The light aluminum beds are designed to carry a distributed load, high point loads not as much. As for load securement, the attach points should tie to the truck frame not a light aluminum deck. Flat bed aluminum semi trailers are built in a different way that adds strength to the deck in certain areas for things like coils. An aluminum "contractors deck" is not the best for highly concentrated point loads.

You would be better off with a piece of 3/4 or 7/8 plywood in the bed of your pick up with anchors for tie downs directly off the bed mounting points. Not sure the aluminum tray bed would gain much in cargo capacity over a stock bed either, pick up beds are not very heavy.

Steve
 
Here's a used aluminum traybed on Craigslist in California. Looking at those frame rails for the bed, they don't inspire confidence. I don't know what Home Depot's traybed underside looks like but will take a look.

Flatbed - auto parts - by owner - vehicle automotive sale

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This sure looks to be a galvanized steel frame with ally decking and folding sides. This would be much better than an aluminum subframe. You are right that this particular one looks a little light weight.
 
Those little ally trays ,8ft x6ft are around $250 each at the 4x4 wreckers.....The previous company vehicle I had used to regularly carry a 2ton bulker bag on the ally tray........I just recently unloaded a big gear shaft from an old crane by rolling it off the edge .....And also bashed in the back with the old crane .....no worries,Ill buy another one from the wreckers when I finish cleaning up the scrap.....Low ally scrap price ATM.


Over here, the "tray-beds" are very rare. You only really see them on Home Depot rental pickups. They are costly also, around $4500-$5000. Over there I know they are pretty common. I don't know why they aren't common here, seems like having fold down sides is a huge plus for hauling many things. Stakebed , utility beds and flatbeds are common here, on chassis-cab pickups.
 
Pick up truck frames are not the same as cab/chassis. Pick up frame would make the tray mount bed much higher on the truck making the load higher CG or top heavy. The light aluminum beds are designed to carry a distributed load, high point loads not as much. As for load securement, the attach points should tie to the truck frame not a light aluminum deck. Flat bed aluminum semi trailers are built in a different way that adds strength to the deck in certain areas for things like coils. An aluminum "contractors deck" is not the best for highly concentrated point loads.

You would be better off with a piece of 3/4 or 7/8 plywood in the bed of your pick up with anchors for tie downs directly off the bed mounting points. Not sure the aluminum tray bed would gain much in cargo capacity over a stock bed either, pick up beds are not very heavy.

Steve


Reason I was pondering on a the aluminum fold-down side type of bed is that my truck's bed is damaged, just cosmetic exterior damage. So I was thinking of replacing with either a used factory bed or a flatbed.

The flatbed is very enticing because of large flat deck and no wheel wells, plus I thought I could mount it lower than the factory bed. I was thinking of Aluminum to eek out more payload capacity. A steel flatbed would likely weigh more than the Chevy factory bed.

As Home Depot uses them, does it mean their beds will handle a lot of abuse and heavy machinery with small footprints? I figured Home Depot would not go with a light duty flatbed, since they have to take into account the people who rent them will haul all kinds of stuff.
 
Reason I was pondering on a the aluminum fold-down side type of bed is that my truck's bed is damaged, just cosmetic exterior damage. So I was thinking of replacing with either a used factory bed or a flatbed.

The flatbed is very enticing because of large flat deck and no wheel wells, plus I thought I could mount it lower than the factory bed. I was thinking of Aluminum to eek out more payload capacity. A steel flatbed would likely weigh more than the Chevy factory bed.

As Home Depot uses them, does it mean their beds will handle a lot of abuse and heavy machinery with small footprints? I figured Home Depot would not go with a light duty flatbed, since they have to take into account the people who rent them will haul all kinds of stuff.

Unless you find a bed made to be used with a pick up frame and wheel boxes the floor height of the bed will be much higher than a pick up bed. That is the whole point to a pick up frame, lower bed height. The wheel wells are where a flat bed would start, if the rails are 3" then the deck height is going to be the wheel well height plus the bed height. So if the bed floor on your pickup is 40" high and the wheel wells are 8" with a tray bed say 4" thick your new bed height is 52" That extra foot of deck height is not a big deal with sand, cement or bricks a couple feet high, put a 3000 machine with a center of mass 3 feet above the deck and the truck is going to very tippy.

As noted above to get a flat floor deck the entire body has to be above the wheels, what ever pluses that style has it comes with a price in load stability. Look at a deck over trailer Vs a car trailer, the car trailer is much lower than the deck over.

Regarding HD buying trucks designed to haul machinery, I can't see that period. They rent the trucks to haul building materials they sell. Again, the distributed load of construction materials is far lower pounds per square inch that machine tools. I would be surprised if the load securement points are designed for the working load limits needed for machine tools. You could probably haul an older small lathe or milling machine 1200~1800 pounds and not damage the deck. The HD trucks were never intended to be a U-Haul kind of rental. Yea people do rent them for other tasks but, that are not built to haul machine tools.

To get the most capacity out of your pickup, the pick bed is really your best choice. A steel flat bed with wood deck may be close to the weight of an aluminum flat bed. Neither of these are a good fit on a pick up. There is a reason you don't see light duty pick up with flat beds very often.
 
The 2500HD has a payload of 3000lbs - 3300lbs

With perhaps a very large safety factor in this number.
One does not want lawsuits.

If you fall asleep and hit a overpass at 70mph just about any tiedown method will not hold.
Now the question is if fall asleep, go off road, yank the thing sideways to miss the overpass, tires screaming, truck now sideways then sideways the other direction as you go underneath ... what holds here?
If it does hold and you are shinny side up thank you Lord. If it does not hold what is to blame?

3-4000 pound what?
Lathes and grinders are not milling machines.
Moved assembled B-ports in a 1500 more than once. :eek: Not so great which is why I always advise removing the top part in lighter trailers or trucks.
Disclaimer,,, Rigging and hauling machine tools on pickups or light trailers is dangerous business and not as easy as it looks.
If anything goes wrong there can be big fines. A friend dropped a small Blanchard on the roadside. The payout much more than the price of the machine.

All things good and nice the tiedowns do nothing and may as well not be there. A 2500HD will not even notice the load. (Actually it rides a tad nicer as the springs are working).
Then there is corners or tight ramps to a freeway, idiot drivers in front of you and so much more.

Bob
 
There is 11 " from top of tire to top of wheel well.

I was thinking if I could have a flatbed with just a fewer inches of clearance between tire and wheel well ? I am not going offroad, so do I really need 11" of clearance ? I do realize the bed will lower a bit with a heavy load, so I take that into consideration.

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