I've unbolted the bed in 8 places, unbolted the fuel filler from the body, removed the tow hitch and bumper but I can not get the bed to budge one bit away from the frame.

Is this common? Does any one have good advice?

Two things I tried, my buddy and I got on each side and tried to pull it up, and the other thing was I put a 2x4 on one of the trusses and tried to jack it up slowly with a floor jack. Neither technique worked.

What else have I forgotten? (I know I need to disconnect the wiring before removing the bed)

 

Does this truck have body lift on it?

James

 

No, my truck currently does not have a body lift.....although I would like a 4crawler 1" BL.

 

really .... there are only 8 bolts holding it down . fuel filler and wiring , whatever ..

unless the bed silencer pads have dissenegrated , and the bed has rusted to the frame .. it should come off ..


just keep liftin'


.

 

try just putting your jack on top of your tire and go up, the bed itself is pretty heavy so it might take a bit.

But thats the best solution i can think of
Good luck and

 

Do you have access to a chain hoist? If you do use the tiedowns and some chain to yank it off. That's what I did with my 87.

 

Get A Bigger Hammer

 

Yep, should be just the 8 bed mount bolts (4 on each side) to remove. Maybe just need to jack it up a bit higher. You need to take the weight of the bed off the frame and suspension and thus the whole back end of the truck will lift up. Could be some of the frame brackets have rusted to the bottom of the bed.

 

spray some rust penetrator on the body/bed mounts and let it soak. If Ohio salts their roads like they did when I lived in NY it will take a little time soaking. Try also chaining the truck frame to the floor jack so that when you are lifting against the bed (use a 2x4 or something to spread the load across the bottom of the bed) it does not try to left the whole back side of the truck.

 

did you disconnect the gas tank tube?

 

ok, great advice everyone. I'll try the different techniques this afternoon and report back on what worked.

 

Success! It took a combination of more PB blaster between the mounts and using a crow bar to pound in between the bed and frame. It finally popped loose.

I've got a lot of work to do to clean up the frame. The main fuel line coming from the tank rusted and spewed fuel everywhere (the main reason I took the bed off).......and now I can't decide between one of Roger's 1" lift or a flat bed!