Bed Mounting Hardware

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Sep 2, 2021 | 09:44 PM

rustyoldtruck

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Bed Mounting Hardware

I have read many posts about bed bolts but most are pretty old and have bad links. I'm having to cut the original bolts off because the square is stripped out. I have found a few sources for the expensive factory bolts but since the holes are stripped, I wouldn't be able to tighten them. Some have said they tack weld them on but I don't have a way to do that. It would be nice to be able to remove them in the future. Some have said that there is a Doorman kit that has a torx head and nut clips that, although it is not specifically listed for a 92, will still work. A few other people have said that the shoulder that is on the factory bolts is needed to keep the metal from caving in and thereby loosing the bolts. Some people have said to just use regular grade 8 hex bolts. Have any of you found a good resource for bed mounting hardware that will safely work? Are there supposed to be insulators between the bed and frame or is it metal to metal? Thanks in advance!

Sep 3, 2021 | 12:15 PM

shadowplane676

Mountain Pass

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I used the doorman kit on my recent bed removal/replacement. Worked fine and had a couple left over as it is a more universal kit. It was on a 1995 F150 8' bed Single Cab.

Sep 3, 2021 | 02:26 PM

rustyoldtruck

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Thanks for your reply! I guess you can get it on Amazon? Was the quality good? Some folks said the threads were too tight and they didn't want to screw together..

Sep 3, 2021 | 02:29 PM

McLeod

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The factory bed bolts on my 93 only act to keep them from spinning so you can do a "one man removal"
Once they round out that is it. Very hard to remove due to the lack of gripping surface on top side of bolt.
I had to weld a nut on top just to get the front two bolts undone.
The "shoulder" on these bolts are not of large enough diameter to serve the purpose of preventing sheet metal collapse.
Where the bolt passes through the bed is a well supported area unlikely to collapse much
The entire length of the bolt will pass right through both the bed and the frame
In fact, even slightly larger bolts will pass right through the bed mounts too.

I needed to replace the two front bolts and decided to just use 1/2" hex bolts in their place.
Worked good if you don't mind seeing the hex instead of the domed head.

Sep 6, 2021 | 04:25 PM

nathan launer

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Quote:

Originally Posted by shadowplane676

I used the doorman kit on my recent bed removal/replacement. Worked fine and had a couple left over as it is a more universal kit. It was on a 1995 F150 8' bed Single Cab.

Can you please advise which doorman kit you used? I'm looking foe the same thing and see a few different models.

Sep 6, 2021 | 10:15 PM

raystankewitz

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From: Central Indiana

I think a number of people have used the Dorman 924-311 bed bolt kit and griped about the nuts being hard to thread. The reason is, the nuts are Elliptical Deformed Locking Nuts. One side of the nut is deformed in to a "Obround" triangular shape. When you run a bolt through it, the obround end elastically deforms back to round, essentially making it a locknut. As such it's also reusable, as long as you can't run the bolt through it by hand. Learned this from working on amusement park rides.

Sep 6, 2021 | 11:04 PM

nathan launer

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Quote:

Originally Posted by raystankewitz

I think a number of people have used the Dorman 924-311 bed bolt kit....

Thanks! I was wondering if I should go with the 924-310 or 924-311 so this is helpful. Looks like the 310 kit has two bolts that are longer than the others and the 311 kit are all the same length.

Last edited by nathan launer; Sep 6, 2021 at 11:09 PM.