This occurred to me a frew years ago when spending a lot of time traveling and staying in some shady hotels. Some of my storage areas would be very hard to access withoul opening the rear hatch and tailgate of the 80. Mine is different than drawers but picture most drawers sliding out the rear. I have a Labs dual swing out bumper. So you cant open the tailgate without opening the swingouts. It occurred to me that a simple padlock that secured the two swingouts together would make most heavy built drawer systems pretty secure.
Obviously nothing will stop a determined theif but you guys know most stuff is smash and grab or crime of opertunity. I dont advicate leaving vaubles in trucks but on some level we all do when we travel. If some meth head stole all your tools and recovery gear to pawn what would that cost to replace? Or even good camping gear is expensive to replace. So if you could leave your drawers packed up and have them be secure from a simple smash and grab it would be kind of nice. I know the best way to avoid a break in in a normal car is to leave NOTHING in out in view. But when somone sees a built truck with out of state tags on it people know it is full of crap. I know if you are in NYC nothing is keeping your s*** safe. But maybe in Kansas off I70 on your way to Moab it might work. Or while you are in a restaurant eating lunch someplace in Baja.
I could easily just loup a chain around my tire carrier and lader on the bumper. But that is kind of obvious and would swing around driving. But a simple tab with a hole in it weded to each end of the swingout would work for a padlock. I think someone had a way that a padlock even works with some of the latch mechanism. Does anyone ever do this when traveling?
On a side note i thought about this today becouse all my recovery gear is in that rear area. It occured to that i could easily get stuck in a situation where something blocks the rear swingouts or even one of them. That would make it kind of hard to get my recovery gear. Something to think about using a drawer system for recovery gear storage. I know i ussualy need to be recovered from a less than ideal location. Not saying that I know of a solution, just somthing to consider.
Obviously nothing will stop a determined theif but you guys know most stuff is smash and grab or crime of opertunity. I dont advicate leaving vaubles in trucks but on some level we all do when we travel. If some meth head stole all your tools and recovery gear to pawn what would that cost to replace? Or even good camping gear is expensive to replace. So if you could leave your drawers packed up and have them be secure from a simple smash and grab it would be kind of nice. I know the best way to avoid a break in in a normal car is to leave NOTHING in out in view. But when somone sees a built truck with out of state tags on it people know it is full of crap. I know if you are in NYC nothing is keeping your s*** safe. But maybe in Kansas off I70 on your way to Moab it might work. Or while you are in a restaurant eating lunch someplace in Baja.
I could easily just loup a chain around my tire carrier and lader on the bumper. But that is kind of obvious and would swing around driving. But a simple tab with a hole in it weded to each end of the swingout would work for a padlock. I think someone had a way that a padlock even works with some of the latch mechanism. Does anyone ever do this when traveling?
On a side note i thought about this today becouse all my recovery gear is in that rear area. It occured to that i could easily get stuck in a situation where something blocks the rear swingouts or even one of them. That would make it kind of hard to get my recovery gear. Something to think about using a drawer system for recovery gear storage. I know i ussualy need to be recovered from a less than ideal location. Not saying that I know of a solution, just somthing to consider.
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