Looking for advice on a flatbed

[BAYNE]

I have a 84 ranger that i want to flatbed but i want to leave the bottom skirts on.. pretty much cut the bed sides down to the floor.. havent seen this done for some reason .. is there a reason why .. good or bad idea and what would i be getting into ..

 

[alwaysFlOoReD]

I think the wheel wells would intrude into the flat. It would look odd.

Richard

 

[Myanarchy]

Cut the inner wells off and run it off pins.

 

[Will]

Flatbeds are high and pickup bed floors are low. I like your thinking because flatbeds often look bad because we see all this spindly looking crap that sheetmetal used to cover. It's an interesting idea, but you have to cut the bed side off well above the floor and build a new floor high enough up to allow the tires room to move with the suspension.

This is a really good start of an idea. It could be the first flatbed on a mini truck that actually looks good.

 

[94 lngbd]

im in the works of building a 90"wide X 96" long flatbed that will eventually be a tilt bed. Its a steel frame but the sides & front & rear will be top & side wrapped with 1/16 diamond plate aluminum. With this dimension it will be approx. 11" wider & 12" longer then that of my 94 long bed. I have been thinking of cutting the bed just above the bottom body line & attaching that lower section to the bottom side of the flat bed.

I would be attaching a 5 gal 28"x8" air tank to bottom of flatbed frame between truck frame & trucks lower bed section & outside of bed section would be a small under bed storage box on passenger side

My thought of making it tilt would be having it hinged at end of truck frame with 1" pillow block bearings on each truck frame & twin 1/4" plate steel welded to bottom of flatbed frame which will come down to the pillow block bearings, which should leave the flat bed over hanging 14" & using the scissor type dump design ,but utilizing a 3000 lb ATV winch with snatch block pull set up. instead of the much heavier designed & more commonly used hydraulic ram set up

The winch & end of cable would be mounted to bottom of reinforced factory cross member that ties frame together at front leaf spring hangers.

Imagine the scissor pivot being between rear end & end of truck frame & that the lower section being bolted to the center C section of truck frame where it will be on grease able 1" flange bearing & the upper section mounted to another set of flange bearings that would be bolted to the flat bed frame.

scissor = <---------o =winch

The scissor mechanism would be welded up using 1/4 plate & angle, may even use [ channel material.

My neighbor has some 3" stainless steel pipe that I may be able to use for building exhaust stacks