Cracked Frame??

[DieselPuter]

Has anyone else experienced a cracked frame from towing? I did a search and came up with nothing. I pulled my bed off last night and have 3 very small cracks, and one that is halfway thru the frame right infront of the middle bed support. I have the entire frame boxed in for extra support, except this small section. Just want to make sure I am fixign this correctly. Thanks

 

[zstroken]

Mine was cracked, pretty much right under the front of the bed, both sides were cracked in the exact same spot. Looks like someone overloaded a the front of the bed. I had it welded up and put some supports on it. It was cracked on the bottom of the frame only.

 

[DieselPuter]

How has the repair held up, and what did you use for supports??

 

[GWBourne]

I have the entire frame boxed in for extra support, except this small section. Just want to make sure I am fixign this correctly. Thanks

if i read this right, then you are saying your frame was boxed except for this area then the crack developed?



and if i am right then all i have to say is... YEAH! thats just what SHOULD have happened...



you close to doubled the strength of the fram in all but one area. this causes a lot less frlexing over the entire frame and puts all of that flex into one area. this is what is causing your crack. the force is going to be there no matter what, and you just took all of the places for it to transfer away and focused them into one much smaller area... .



again, i could be off on waht i am reading...

 

[DieselPuter]

Thats what I was thinking

When it was boxed in 4 years ago he did do the little section where the fuel lines come out of the frame rail up to the gas tank. So he 4 way boxed in that section and I re-routed the fuel lines. I am thinking that there will be little no flex, which I am thinking should be ok in a tow truck application. I was jsut wondering if other guys have experienced cracked frames and how they went about fixing them and how the fix has held up... ...

 

[GWBourne]

the best thing to do would be to box the entire frame... . hard to do and not fun, NEXT best thing to do is remove some of the previous job, a few inches back from the crack, then re box the section past the crack in a slightly thinner material and make sure your ends are not flat. "fish eye" them in a nice even and smooth line. this will transfer the stress in a much better way. the problem could still happen again.



as for the crack itself, get out the die grinder, and "V" the crack into the frame on one side. stop drill ALL "spider legs" of the crack, then using a nice deep penetrating weld, fill it in. do not plate over it, as it will cause you many problems in the end.