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Bed modification ideas

jimm1009

Well-known member
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Location
Louisville, KY
I am purchasing property that needs clearing. Obviously a drop side bed would be best but not all of us have one. From the former of a M35A2C with drop sides they are extra noisy going down the road but they do have their purposes / advantages.
My M35A2 truck is with-winch. What I need is some sort of a temporary rake system to help unload the bed when full of brush and small trees. Obviously they are not real big if I am tossing them up there by hand but when it comes to a fully load bed of individually light items the weight is much more.
Anyone short of a tilt bed modification devised a way to pull this kind of load out of the truck bed into a burn pile? I imagine a steel leaf rake turned upside down but much bigger of course. I guess I could even use my M1009 as the winch by pulling it out backwards with a log chain hooked to it. Ideas and thoughts are most welcome.
I can not afford to rent a tilt bed conventional truck and this is part of why I purchased this truck to begin with so I want it to finally earns it's living for a while. I do have a M105 trailer to use as well.
jimm1009, aka Jim
 

runk

Active member
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Location
Houston, TX
I've seen a lot of trash hauling trailers set up with a 2nd wall at the head of the trailer.
Wall is made of heavy plywood reinforced with lumber and chains or cables attached to either side.
At the dump, they attach the chains or cables to one of the dozers and pull everything off the trailer.
(Called a pull off service, around here its about $50 at the dump.)
Then the hauler sets the wall back on the trailer and they are ready for another load.

Also seen the same sort of idea for gravel etc.
Heavy sheets of plywood (or something else) put down over the bottom of the bed and pulled off the bed to dump the gravel.
I tried this, and discovered you need to really reinforce the cable attachment points.
 

VPed

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Clint, TX
I think northern tool has a pickup bed unloaded consisting of a fabric that is placed under the load and a winching device that rolls up the fabric at the tailgate end. This results in the load being pulled rearward. You would need to make one long and wide enough for the deuce bed.
 

NY Tom

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Riverhead, NY
Believe it or not I recently used my deuce for this same purpose. Found that if I put a large branch or small tree on the bottom and the rest of the brush on top I could pull the whole load out almost by grabbing the thick end of the bottom branch and everything else came off on top of it. Required putting the thick ends toward the tailgate basically for all the branches. I was surprised at how easily it came off.
 

tobyS

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Steel Soldiers Supporter
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IN
Would seem a long cable or chain, possibly attaching to the sides while loading to keep it in place, would hook to a tractor or tree. About 30' for the deuce and 20' for the 105. You wanted a reason to have a long snatch cable anyway.
 

jimm1009

Well-known member
1,163
68
48
Location
Louisville, KY
Believe it or not I recently used my deuce for this same purpose. Found that if I put a large branch or small tree on the bottom and the rest of the brush on top I could pull the whole load out almost by grabbing the thick end of the bottom branch and everything else came off on top of it. Required putting the thick ends toward the tailgate basically for all the branches. I was surprised at how easily it came off.
That is a Simply Knarly idea. Thank you very much. Sometimes you can't see the forest for the trees.
Jim
 

Mullaney

Well-known member
Steel Soldiers Supporter
Supporting Vendor
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Location
Charlotte NC
I am purchasing property that needs clearing. Obviously a drop side bed would be best but not all of us have one. From the former of a M35A2C with drop sides they are extra noisy going down the road but they do have their purposes / advantages.
My M35A2 truck is with-winch. What I need is some sort of a temporary rake system to help unload the bed when full of brush and small trees. Obviously they are not real big if I am tossing them up there by hand but when it comes to a fully load bed of individually light items the weight is much more.
Anyone short of a tilt bed modification devised a way to pull this kind of load out of the truck bed into a burn pile? I imagine a steel leaf rake turned upside down but much bigger of course. I guess I could even use my M1009 as the winch by pulling it out backwards with a log chain hooked to it. Ideas and thoughts are most welcome.
I can not afford to rent a tilt bed conventional truck and this is part of why I purchased this truck to begin with so I want it to finally earns it's living for a while. I do have a M105 trailer to use as well.
jimm1009, aka Jim
Pulling branches out of a pickup truck or small trailer works pretty well with 3 or 4 long ropes. Lay the ropes on the bed of the truck/trailer. To the ground on one end, the other end out over the hood. Load up, then flip the rope over the top of the load.

That makes 3 or 4 loops that you connect to a clevis or some other method to connect all of the ropes together. Then a chain or heavier rope from the clevis to a tree and drive away. Untie one end of the ropes to reclaim your ropes... Nothing fancy but fairly effective.

The unloader suggestion by VPed works really well too.
Be sure to add another cheap plastic tarp under the fabric so it slides easily as you crank it off your deuce...
 
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