Have you sold a lid to a customer with a JDM 80 and wheel carrier (1 Viewer)

[callum]

Hi, not sure if this is the best place to post this, but maybe the info will help.

I've just been out measuring up my tailgate to make an openable lid for it (i'm afraid you're a bit too far away for me to buy one from you) but came a cross a bit of a peculiarity.

It seems the JDM tailgates have some extra steelwork inside for the factory wheel carrier catch to prevent the tailgate from being stoved in when the wheel carrier is shut.

I've attached some pictures to let you see what's there. The reinforcement follows the line of the spot welds in a kind of curved T shape, so a 1 piece tailgate lid will not be too easy a fit.

I'm going to have to go away and think of a solution now, not sure if i'll go with two doors or try and adjust the reinforcement.

Anyway, i thought the info would help, should you get any canadian customers with JDM 80's and factory wheel carriers.

 

[callum]

and the other 3 pics.

spotwelds highlighted in red.

 

[Akella]

It is good info but you better post it in 80's section. some people will appreciate this information.

 

[kevinmrowland]

I was just dealing with this same thing.

I have a handful of lids in JDM cruisers, not all of them have tire carriers but on those that do the tailgate lid install is a lot harder and I don't recommend it for long run durability.
I'll post the photos that my customer sent me, he ended up making it work, but at the loss of some of the reinforcement.

There is a way around this since the tailgate lids that I make are so much stronger than the factory inner skin it is possible to bolt the reenforcing structure to the new lid and make it all work together.
Without one here to work with I'm not able to provide the templates or bracket for this though.



These are the really nice set of pics that my customer sent to me:

 

[kevinmrowland]

And the rest of the set:

 

[kevinmrowland]

Considering how weak the stock tailgates are that the US gets, I am shocked at how sturdy Toyota made this upgrade, quite impressed.

These tailgates are easily 3 times as strong as the US spec ones.

KR

 

[callum]

Ah, the good old internet. Post a quandry at night about something you can't really see and by the time you wake up in the morning someone's posted a pic with the whole thing cut wide open.

Thanks for posting those pics, they're really helpful and I think they're provided me with a solution.

I should probably have expected to find some reinforcement in there, but it never occurred to me to look for it. The area takes quite a bit of force and I actually had to weld up the black latch on the outside of the tailgate at the end of last year because it had cracked.

With that in mind I think I shall try to retain as much of the reinforcement as I can. The top couple of spots (lid hinge end) should be retain-able and if I put maybe a 50mm kink in the closing edge of the lid (a bit like a land rover discovery 3 tailgate) I should be able to attach the reinforcement to the lid frame. Some angle between should finish it off and hide the rough edges hopefully.

If I get a shot at it over the weekend, I can stick up some pics if you don't mind me cluttering your forum.


Thanks again.

Callum

 

[callum]

well, a frame now exists, but i don't have a hinge yet, or indeed any ply to make a lid from. But i do have some latches! It doesn't really look much, but it took a lot of measuring and remeasuring and it was a challenge keeping things square working on a not very flat concrete floor. Near the end i had to cut into it so i could re-true the shape and then weld the slits up, but its all square now.

I'll get a hole cut in the tailgate next weekend and fix it in. Just adding a coat of paint each evening at the moment, although I'll need to make a decision pretty quickly about a tough top coat.

Still not sure if I should have gone without the kink as in that other post, but I'll see when I go to fit it how it lines up with the reinforcement in the tailgate etc. Hopefully the aperture is big enough to allow me to stuff in the bits and pieces it was intended for.

I'll stick up a picture once I have the frame in. Maybe it will be of some assistance to your customers who have jdm wheel carriers.

 

[kevinmrowland]

That looks great!
Thanks for posting, I like to see what others come up with.Curious as to why you went with the kink? Just so you could make it a bit wider once you got past the latch?
I like the look, kind of reminds my of LR Discovery swing gates, but you made a lot more work for yourself there!
Gate looks great so far, now you are going to have to work on that garage.

KR

 

[callum]

Hey what are you saying about my 'workshop'! That's garage journal material you're looking at there.
Actually that workshop is not even mine, its my parents. Its a little tight in there, but with the heater on, its quite cosy. Amazingly a car used to fit in there, but now its mostly tools, crap and my bikes, some of which are living in the back of my land rover whilst i need the space to work. I suppose the benefit of having a crappy little garage to work on is anything bigger seems like paradise.

Anyway, back to the tailgate lid. I kept forgetting to photograph it, but i thought i'd give you some 'almost done' pics. I'm still working on the lid, making sure the contact adhesive is set, after which the carpet needs trimmed. Yes you did read carpet i'm afraid, 80 owners are like 60 owners but softer, well this one is at least. The lid is in the photograph under those encyclopædias. Its just ply, as with your prototypes, and required an enormous amount of time with a rasp and a file to fit perfectly. How you managed to churn 10 of these out in a weekend i'll never know! In any case, it closes nicely. I have the black Southco push to close latches and time will tell if i should have gone with the turn type.

The frame, as you'll see, is in place (for about the 10th time) and now almost in for good. I got some nice hex countersunks to fix it down with as i thought the pozi ones were a bit ugly, but the pitch of the countersink is slightly different so they don't fit. The bare bit of carpet at the bottom is where the previous owner used the tailgate as a cutting mat or something. He/she was kind enough to leave a corresponding bald bit in the floor too, but at least that's covered by the load mat. I might see if i can get hold of another bit of carpet at some stage to tidy things up.

As i mentioned earlier, i decided to keep the wheel carrier reinforcement, so the spot welds are still in place where it is not cut away at the top and bottom. After testing the closing, i was happy enough with the stiffness to just put grommet strip on the cut bits rather than adding more steel and fixing them to my frame. I suppose i can add it later if it becomes an issue.

I've lined it with flashing tape as you recommended, although it would seem flashing tape in the uk market is meant to look like lead and i presume the american market stuff is meant to look like aluminium, so its not as bright looking as some of the installations i've seen pictures of. Anyway it was meant to prevent things from clanging about and denting the tailgate, so hopefully it will fulfill that role.

I've skipped to the last step and gone straight to the fill it with crap stage already. i got my winch stuff and my tools in, which was the main goal, so i'm pretty happy with the outcome.

I'll post finished pics when i, um, finish i suppose. Thanks for providing the inspiration to do this, its taken a while, but i think its been worth it.

cheers

callum

 

[callum]

and one last pic.

 

[callum]

aww hell, wasn't getting much reading done anyway.

trimmed the lid and screwed it in. Few wee bits of tidying up to do, but it looks alright. Didn't quite manage to get it lying flat in the open position though, forgot about the carpet adding depth .

Got a bit of studying to do in the next few weeks, so that will give it some time to settle in and see how it goes without me fiddling. I'd quite like to try some grey plastic dye on the handles to get them to look a bit more like they fit in, but it that can wait. Will see if any bits fall off or it falls apart before i get into such cosmetics.

Anyway, thanks for posting all those development pics in the beginning, they really helped and i dare say helped me avoid a fair few pitfalls, even if i found some of my own.

Callum

 

[kevinmrowland]

Nicely done! I see now why you had the jog in there, left you room to keep the lower couple of spot welds for the tire carrier.
The space worked out fairly well though, not as much room as the non-tire-carrier versions, but still plenty of useable space. You wont be carrying any shot guns or fly rods in there, but not bad.

For fitting the lids I do everything with router templates, no filling and grinding that way.
And I made the same mistake with the hinge on my first lid, wanted to keep it as low profile as possible but wound up with a lid that didn't open all the way flat. Ended up being a real pain.
Some of the stainless latches would look really nice on there with the grey carpet.......



KR