Secure Your Tailgate for $1.50

Over on Reddit yesterday a new 3G owner with only 300 miles on his new beauty, took off down the street with the tailgate down, hit a bump and the gate flipped up, unhinged and fell off. It was dragging by one sides cable. By the time he pulled over the gate was toast. This can happen on any truck if the gate comes up high enough. Our user manual even says to never drive with the gate down but as long as you have a load on it, it could never pop off. So I added my $1.50 lock that I’ve used on all my pickups. Mostly to stop gate theft. I normally just align the clamp facing down so you’d need a long extension from underneath to release it. On our G3s with locking handles, just tighten from the top. Took me 3 mins to install. Gate can never come off til the clamp is removed.

 

Did the same on my Tacoma year ago works great

 

Ok, I'm stupid. How does this keep the gate from coming off? Is there a video somewhere that gives greater detail?

 

Not stupid at all! If you tilt the gate up just about 30° and pull the gate towards you on the right side it slides right off the pivot post towards you. Then you slide the whole gate to the right to slide it off the left pivot post. (of course you would release the retaining straps first) The collar you see under the hose clamp is not full circle. The bottom back 40% is open to allow you to slide the gate on and off the post. The hose clamp keeps it from lifting off the post.

 

The metal that the clamp is wrapped around is "C" shaped. So, by opening the tailgate partially then lifting up, you can normally remove the tailgate (about a 15 second process). The clamp prevents lifting the gate and subsequently removing it from the vehicle; that is until you remove the clamp...

A few companies also sell 'tailgate locks' with a similar (but allegedly more secure design); most are not worth any more $$ than a hose clamp. It's a deterrent and designed to just slow down tailgate theft (a bit).

Tailgate theft was the CAT theft of 2014-2018...

 

Thank you guys for explaining. Makes perfect sense now!

 

Did this on my Tacoma 15 years ago. Not really needed here since the tailgate locks.

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=04uHUIdSnx4

 

Nice, used this for my older Tacoma and put jb weld in the threads/gear to make it just a little harder to steal. This was back when tailgate theft was common.

 

Excuse my ignorance on tailgate theft but, why tailgates? Scrapped for crack or is the used part market high for tailgates. Someone lost a tailgate and need a replacement so one gets stolen and the whole row of dominoes falls?

 

Stolen by druggies because they were easy pickins on trucks with no tailgate locks. Stolen in 5 minutes and 5 minutes later sold on e-bay. Not really an issue on those with tailgate locks, which seem to be getting to be more standard.

 

Yep did the same thing. Ended up taking it off once I got the pop and lock.

 

Yeah, I put a Dyno-Lock electric tailgate lock on the Tacoma... but just left the clamp on. No reason to remove it unless or until the tailgate needed to come off. And it never did.

 

The tailgate can’t be stolen by simply opening it if the truck is locked.

 

Thanks for posting this. Recently bought a Tundra and it’s my first truck so I didn’t know this was possible. I want to add the auto tailgate lock eventually but this is an easy fix in the meantime!

 

my only question, why have the tailgate down if you dont have a load to justify the gate down (and keeping a weight on the tailgate from this happening). otherwise this is a mute point from my pov.

 

Im going to do it to deter theft, but there’s always the possibility of forgetting to close tailgate, especially when loading kids in the truck.

 

you should definitely close the tail gate if you're loading kids back there. You might not WANT to, but you should

 

exactly- people were getting tailgates stolen in major cities, ‘replacements’ were being ‘sourced’ in smaller cities. Many older trucks didn’t have a locking tailgate so it became a 30 second job.

 

You may want to put some xpel or other paint protecting film under the clamp. I could see it causing a rust problem over time.

 

lol, I got a good laugh out of that! The other day my daughter wanted to ride in the bed with the tonneau closed….would make for a more peaceful drive!

 

Yeah my tailgate came off the other day just because I closed it with an object on the drive side and I was pushing up only on the passenger side. Caught me off guard.

I’m just gonna use a plastic tie or rubber band since my tailgate locks.

 

What dimension hose clamp would be the closest size? I had a really nice couple of T-bolt hose clamps in stainless, left over from some motorcycle projects, would be nice to use those for something!

 

The older gen trucks didn’t come standard with auto locks, you had to use the key to lock/unlock. So if you forgot to specifically lock the tailgate it was easy to steal. They were selling for about $600 on eBay back then.

 

The non locking tailgate for my gen3 2016 Tacoma was $3500 painted with the backup camera. Protected for $1.50

 

Lock the tailgate is the best way, I could open that hose clamp with anything flat. It just take more time.

 

We’re not installing it here for security. It’s so the gate can’t jump off if you’re driving around with it down and no load on it. (Something most wouldn’t never do)

 

If your tailgate came off while driving, you should win a lottery ticket.

 

Glad I found this solution. IDK how, but I went to close my tailgate yesterday and as I lifted it, it came off the hinge and fell, resting on my bumper. I've never had a tailgate do that simply by trying to close it.

 

Yes, these new gates are the loosest/easiest to remove of any truck I’ve owned. The clamp will solve it.