How strong are the bed sidewalls?

[jblc]

How strong are the bed sidewalls? Are they strong enough to attach (for example) steel rails to, to hold a sleeping platform ~ 14" off the bottom?

I had a good (standard) sleeping setup in my '97 ranger, and I'm thinking of doing it a different way for the '21 to free up more bottom space.

My default: have the usual support legs to the bed surface.
But if the sidewalls are strong enough, I could just put a steel rail on all sides, and place cross-members and the sleeping surface fastened to those.

Has anyone tried something like this?

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[dcg]

For what it's worth, the tie downs have a capacity of 661 pounds (each).

Since there are three on each side, and the sidewalls need to support the tie downs, I'd think each side wall would be able to support at least 1,983 pounds - sounds like your rails would somewhat evenly distribute the weight, if I'm understanding the idea correctly.

But I'm not a mechanical engineer, so proceed at your own risk

edit - worth noting the above significantly exceeds the payload rating of the Ranger. I'm not suggesting you throw a ton on each rail; just that I don't think the strength of the rail will be your weak point.

 

[daniel3507]

I can't remember who it was, but someone mounted a hi lift jack directly to the inside of the bed and overtime it started to actually tear the inside of the bed. I would go with something with legs just as a precaution

Edit: found it
https://www.ranger5g.com/forum/threads/psa-mounting-hi-lift-jack-to-bed-side.8479/

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