Tail Trimming? Pics!

[Cole]

I just can't seem to stay away I've built dozens of rigs and now have a full size Dodge to play with. (1998 V10 Quad Cab 2500 Shortbed)

Want to set it up for a bit of off road use. First up would be to trim the rear corners of the bed before I bend them up.

Would love to see what others have done. I have collected a couple of pics around the net, but want to see more.

[redthies]

Hey, it's a 98 V10... Probably not too expensive these days, so be brave, grab your sawzall/grinder and have at 'er! I just had the grinder going on my 99 Dodge yesterday! Felt good to make sparks!

That red Dakota looks badazz!

[Cole]

Part of the whole reason I bought the truck. It was only $2,700 My excuse was to have a truck around to do some house projects.......but it may as well get some mods


But it has to sit outside so I want to keep it somewhat tasteful. Here is the truck in question.

[redthies]

The dog in front of the truck looks much happier in the snow for some reason...

[redthies]

I think that you would do fine with a small lift, some 35s and a stronger than stock set of bumpers. Unless you are trying to build a full on crawler, you should be fine like that. I have to show up at clients houses in my do-it-all Dodge/Ford or whatever, so I try to keep it stock-ish looking. No exo-cages or cut bodies for me, unless I hit the lotto and get a Defender 110 with the factory exo. I think it is hard to sell the wife on the necessity of a cut body to head to Home Depot or the dump! Nice starting point though

[Cole]

Don't want to lift it. If I ever put bigger tires on it I would rather trim sheet metal a little sheet metal. 99% of lifts give up the tonnage rating of the truck and strive for "ride quality" Truck needs to stay functional.

As far as "showing up somewhere in it"....I have 8 other vehicles of much nicer quality in the garage I would rather "show up" in

The rears bumper of this truck is already bent to hell, so I need to replace, or build one. If I build one I would like to trim their rear corners. That will give me much more functional clearance than a lift alone. After than I may find a high clearance front and then just streamline the bottom of the frame, may be clock the TCase, etc. Lots of ways to make a functional off road rig without just lifting it. (which makes it worse on road, on off camber, on steep climbs, etc)

[gavan]

Just a different thought...

Replace the whole bed with something cut a little higher



Military trailer beds are easy to work with, tough, and look pretty cool

[Cole]

Certainly a thought. I always liked the way they look. (and that Jeep looks like a Military CJ10 that may have been set up to come with that bed)

However, it's a much more complicated and expensive task than just trimming my current bed and building a bumper. (keeps my topper, lights, fuel filler, etc).

[gavan]

Certainly a thought. I always liked the way they look. (and that Jeep looks like a Military CJ10 that may have been set up to come with that bed)

However, it's a much more complicated and expensive task than just trimming my current bed and building a bumper. (keeps my topper, lights, fuel filler, etc).

It is a CJ-10, but it was built as a airplane tug. I did just a little work on it to make it into a 1 ton cummins powered pickup truck

As always, it depends on what you are doing and how you plan on using it. Trailer beds are 200-300 if you do your shopping, and if you wad it up into a tree, it is a lot cheaper to replace than a regular pickup bed. A lot of work once, or messing with it over and over again for years. At least thats how I looked at it.

[Cole]

Cool rig!

I'm just trying to keep this truck a little bit more low key of a project than some of mine in the past. (frame splicing, custom suspension components, crazy axle builds, etc) Have plenty of projects in the garage that I would rather spend time on. The truck needs to stay tow rig/heavy haul useful with a touch of off-road flare and expedition type use. (it still needs to pull a race car trailer, load big motorcycles in the back etc). I got carried away with my last resto-mod build and defeated some of its basic usefulness.