Pickup bed lean…bad leaf bushing, shock?

You don't have a butterfly IH you can toss on it for a sec? If you have a compressor - even a pancake - they're cheap af at the big box stores, could save you busted knuckles and mangler recipro saw.

 

Oooh wait, right-angle impact.

 

No, you need more torque than a butterfly impact to get that nut off an I haven’t seen one small enough to fit in there.

 

Huh. I've used mine in some pretty tight spots and it worked fine. But I had the wrong damn name again. I had to go look at mine. I got mine for $25 at HD, it's a Campbell Hausfield or however you spell that.

Virtually identical to this, $20 at HF: I've used it to throw on sport shock/strut kits on previous cars. Hasn't failed me yet.

Edit: Maybe because it was little shit Honda or German imports. I see the 50ft# tq rating on that one I linked. Or maybe the one I bought 15 years ago is more stout...

 

Oh no. lolol

Not even close to what I need. I had a 2ft pipe over a 14 inch 3/8” drive breaker bar to remove it and she wouldn’t budge.

 

Oh yeah. Anything more than 12" of extra torque leverage and the Dremel is coming out.

I won't use a sawzall in tight quarters. I'll be cussing because I'm bound to smack something I don't want to.

 

Okay, so it definitely looks like the back of the access cab is sitting lower which I believe might be the body mount. You can kinda see on the left side where the moulding is misaligned and how it sits lower. I checked the mount and I can “bounce” the cab on the frame rail by pushing up on it so it’s just the rubber portion flexing. Strangely on the right side the cab moves in unison with the frame and no bouncing other than the leaf springs going up and down but it’s like that on the left and that should be expected. So bad body mount?

 

Check both the cab mounts and the bed mounts for uniformity. Maybe a bad Mount, maybe a twisted frame, hard to say.

 

Bed mounts are more like steel strut loops. Hard to imagine someone being able to crush one. Cab mounts are rubber and can deteriorate over time. I need to replace all of mine. Entire cab is shifted back towards the bed after an “incident” with a highway bridge retaining wall.

 

I'm in the Northeast - That same cab mount rusted through on mine. It sits on a washer as an isolator and that washer rusted enough for the cab to drop on the mount.

Kind of a pain to remove the bolt, but every thing else is easy, you can lift the cab quite a bit for more working room without unhooking anything.

Good luck!

 

Yeah, seems like the cab is bouncing and hitting the mount directly when I hit a pothole. Not a very pleasant feeling. Wish I had a GoPro camera to confirm whether that is happening or not.

 

Why not just tape something in that spot and ride over a bump, see if the cab marks it?

You could use a transfer marker either on the thing you tape there, so when the hit happens, ink/paint will transfer to the opposite surface and confirm.

Alternately, you can use something that will deform, break, or crush, like a thin sheet of styrofoam.

 

That’s a good idea. I’ll check on that. Replacing a cab mount isolator is a helluva lot easier than changing a leaf spring bushing.

 

If you use stryo, you may also find the CLANG goes away. Or an old shop towel. Or anything similarly soft, which could be another very simple indicator.

 

I had the same thing about a year ago. What a pain to solve the problem. Went to 3 places before they found the problem was one of the front springs. The front did not look off that much. Why everyone including myself thought it was the rear with a 1" difference.

First tried new general leaf springs in the rear. Finally to fix installed new OEM springs in the front.

Check the front. And jack up the low side so exactly the same as the other side. This is what told us the problem was the front.

 

It’s not the front. I can feel and hear metal against metal right behind me in the drivers seat. Even going over a pothole at slow speed, I don’t really feel/hear it until after the front tire has passed over the bump.

 

I'd think you could measure to the bedrail on all four corners on flat, level pavement to confirm it's not the bed also...

 

I did in that last pic I posted, except I measured from the ground to the wheel arch. Nothing off except the back left corner of the cab.

 

I think, deductively, you know the problem then.

Clang sound behind driver seat
Back left corner of cab lower

Sounds like it could easily be a bad body mount. I'd replace with rubber vs. poly, poly tends to squeak like a mf.

 

Well just got home. Used my foot and 1/2 my weight to push diagonally against the running board in the rear and I can hear the cab clank against metal as it’s pushed down. Doesn’t do that on the right, so it’s definitely looking like a need to replace the body mount.

 

Oh, that’s not good at all. It’s pushed through 1/2-3/4”. I may have to reinforce the top part of the frame by inserting a plate in between the mount and the frame for it to hold.

 

Body mounts are available if you want to go that route...

https://www.autorust.com/product-category/toyota/tundra-2000-2006/

 

Not sure what it's like on our trucks, but I've had to do it on a few other vehicles. It was just a matter of lifting th

Yo dawg, nature heard you like rust, so she put some rust in your rust so you can rust while you rust!

 

Well good news for once. Started pulling that metal debris on top and it looks like the frame mount is still intact. Must’ve been metal from the isolator itself that came through.

Now comes the tough part. The center bolt can be freed. I’m not sure how to get out the side bolts seized inside the nuts welded to the support.

 

I'm not one of those people that can easily visualize what people are saying. I think if I had pics of what you're looking at I may be able to give advice.

 

Here’s a video of some guy using aftermarket mounts on the tundra. His solution was the cut the welded nut and bolt to get them out. I may do the same.

https://youtu.be/jb_GlNcruQ0

 

Yeah, if something like my Mountain ratcheting double-box pivot-head wrenches be able to get to the back side? They're usually pretty good about getting on weird-to-reach and nuts requiring leverage (think: serp belt tensioner)

Stupid design, nut should be welded on the other side, I'm guessing Toyota factory is bolting mounts to the frame, then dropping cab on later. So, without lifting the cab (after you remove the center bolt first, or it won't budge), I don't see another way you could get them out easily except a ratcheting box-end.

 

To break the rust bond I’d have to torch it (Not a wise idea so close to the gas tank) or soak the end in muriatic (HCl) or phosphoric acid. Without jury rigging a setup to hold a flask or pint size container of the correct plastic, I’ll probably have cut it as shown with a dremel.

 

Makes sense. I always hate grinding into anything, then you need to etch-prime and/or find another way to seal, give proper cure time, then start doing what you want. Just be sure to use a proper washer where the welded nut was, I'd also use poly-lock (nylock?) nuts for the replacements.

Sucks it's not on the other side and you could use heat, then hit it with a stream of PBB while it's still hot, drawing the penetrant in. I'm pig-headed, so I'd still try to whack each bolt from underneath with a punch a few times, then try to wrench it from above. Probably in vain, I'm sure.