Deuce Truck Racks

[JHS]

Hi all,

Been Creeping on this site for awhile before I bought my M35a2. Many thanks to this community for providing great info!

I thought Id share with everyone my idea for removable racks for the deuce. I own a small Welding/Fab shop and use the deuce as my welding rig. I've just started out and hopefully more mods will follow

I just finished a handicapped railing and had some 1 1/4" SCH40 pipe leftover. In the past Ive built racks out of 1 1/2" SCH40, but any bigger and they would have interfered with the troop seats. Having the racks allowed me to build the 23' rails in house, and install on site with no on site welding or struggling in the field trying to assemble them. Needless to say I got a few more look than I usually do, LOL

My goals were...

• To have the option of running the rack with or without the side boards/head board.
• To not look all hacked up like it wasn't "factory" to the ordinary guy
• To be completely and quickly removable, yet strong
• To be flush when removed so I can lay large loads on the bed rails

First, I cut 4 peices of 2x2x1/8 box tube for the stake pockets.

Then I plasma cut the rails in the front and rear to clear the tubing, look how close the troop seats fit!

Pockets welded in. I will add a support back to the bed later to beef the rear up a bit more.

Then I built the racks on the table. Very nice to have a true surface! Also so extra round weld on caps got to find a home.

Racks test fit good!

2" DOM I had laying around worked perfect over the 1 1/4" Pipe for stops

Rails on and ready for install!

All and all these worked great. I want to incorporate my deuce into the business as much as possible and find as many practical uses for her. That's almost the best part of owning the truck for me, is showing people how **** awesome and useful they are! haha.

If I had enough material, I was going to do a bolt on rack off the front bumper, but that will have to wait till the next railing job

Hope you enjoy and maybe this helps some guys build there own!


Also shout out to peashooter and faith tire for my sweet new MRAP wheels. Its nice being able to turn lock -lock without the 15.5's rubbing!

 

[papabear]

I love seeing mods to make an MV useful in regular occupations yet easily removed so the truck looks basically stock when called for.

Looks like you did a good job on a very useful project!!

 

[army70deuce]

As a fellow welder with my own fab shop I've also been thinking about a way to use the deuce to haul 20' lengths of steel. Don't always order enough to qualify for free delivery from the supplier. Glad someone else tried it out first. Definitely want to figure out a front bumper attachment. Great work, what's the weight capacity up top?

 

[JHS]

Thanks guys.

Army deuce, one thing I will probably do in the future is run another pipe parallel under the existing one, space it about 2" lower, then weld in some flat bars to help the top pipe carry the load better. I've built truck racks for pickups out of 1 1/2 SCH 40 that contractors have then overloaded the crap out of and actually collapsed the bedsides. Hahaha

That being said I bet they'd hold quite a bit, especially if you doubled up the cross bars. You'd probably tip the truck over from the center of gravity being to high before they broke!

Thanks again!

 

[porkysplace]

If you tie it into the front bumper your going to have issues with frame flex .

 

[JHS]

perhaps, but it shouldn't be too bad with most loads Id be using it for. Like small 1 1/4 pipe rails or similar. What ever load I put on it would flex, but would be much more secure / less flex than no front rack at all.

 

[Pugsley]

I would think for on road use the flex would not be enough to worry about.

 

[rustystud]

There are ways of getting around frame flex. Like poly bushings on the bumper and the top plate. Our busses use something similar on the stanchions since the frame on a 60ft buss does a lot of twisting.