Hey, I'm trying to take my bed off my truck, I put an impact on the nut under the frame, but the bolts just spin up top. I know they aren't supposed to. Does anyone have any ideas on what to do?

 

When I took mine off I had to weld 5/8" nuts to the bolt head. Then get a buddy to unscrew them out while you hold the nut from underneath

 

You can just tack weld them to the bed itself if you're working alone.

 

Yeah, I got a friend I work with, that would work welding a nut on the head. Welding them to my bed won't work for me this time because when the bed goes back on the frame I plan on having a body lift go on too (longer bolts). Thanks for the replies.

 

Not saying you can't cut the tack free.
Most times, up here in winter salt territory, the bolts are f'd anyhow by the time you get them off.

 

i don't know if i'd want to weld them to the bed. the bed is only sheetmetal and it'd be a lot more grinding once you get the nuts off anyway.

remember to put anti-seize on them when you put them back on.

when i put mine back in i left the nut welded to the head of the bolt so i could tighten them. once the bed was installed and the bolts tight i then grinded off the nuts. once finished i sprayed the heads with duplicolor bed undercoat.

 

I use vise grips on the head and go under neath with a ratchet. I only have the 2 front and 2 back bolts though, so it's kind of easy to do myself. The middle ones may not work for this method.

 

I ground the heads off and knocked them through the bed. Once I knocked them through, I cut 6 blocks from a 2x4, then set the bed on those to finish knocking the bolts through and free the bed. My bolts were rusted so bad, there was no way to get them off otherwise.

 

The only problem with this method is it will damage your bed when you grind them off so if your planning on keeping the bed you might want to shy away from that idea. I have done this a bunch of times and the best way that worked for me was to tack them to the bed with a small weld and use an impact to zip em off. When I was done I used a grinder and removed the tack weld and coated the bed and no one could ever tell I did it that way.

 

I tried the welding a nut to the top of the bolt, but my welding skills failed me. We ended up grinding the head off the bolts, punching them down into the bed, jacking up which ever corner of the bed 1/2 inch, and cut the bolts inbetween the bed and the frame with a saw-zall (Spelling on saw-zall?). All were good ideas, thanks for all the advise. I plan on putting the bed back on using hardware that is used on 2005-newer Superduties. Round headed bolts with hex head inserts, and on the frame is a threaded clip, so all you do is loosen from the top side.
(PS: Don't laugh at me 'cause it took longer to get the bed off than it did the entire front clip of my truck... ;-)

 

how well did you clean up the bolt heads? I hit them with the angle grinder first to make sure i was welding to good clean metal. my dad is a rookie welder and we used a simple little tiny welder and only tacked them in a few spots and the welds held fine. I can't believe you weren't able to weld the nut.

 

I welded a piece of rebar to the bolt, when kept it from spinning after it bumped the edge of the bed.