How to Weigh Down Truck Bed for Better Traction?

Pickups are designed to carry heavy loads in their beds. However, in rain or frost conditions, the truck may not be able to properly grip the road surface.

An empty bed doesn’t provide enough weight on the rear axle for the drive wheels to hold the ground firmly.

This can lead to loss of control on slippery roads. But you can avoid it by burdening the rear of the 2WD truck with sandbags, concrete blocks, or an installed load.

This article provides detailed instructions on how to achieve the desired effect and reduce slipping on the road.

Table of Contents

How to make the body heavier? The standard way

You need something heavy. Typically, sandbags, water tanks, or concrete blocks are used for weighting. Choose a suitable option for yourself so that it’s useful on the road and does not damage the car.
Place a weight on the rear axle. Precisely on the rear axle, since this part of the car provides traction with the road, which means it should be “pressed to the ground”.
Fixation. This is perhaps the most important step. Don’t underestimate it, because the load on the way may shift or even fly out of the body. Therefore, you should take care of its secure fixation in the right place. To do this, use cables and/or covering material to wrap the weights tightly.
Test. Don’t rely on fate, it’s better to foresee everything and check the reliability of the fixed load before the trip. Try to check it on different sections of the road and at different speeds, and fix the load again if it wasn’t reliable before.

Drive carefully: your truck will still not have as much traction on snow as it does on dry roads.

Items you will need:

Sandbags
Cinder blocks
Ropes

If you are trying to load a heavy motorized object into your truck, such as a lawnmower, ATV, or scooter, you can simply lift it the ramp.

If you regularly lift very heavy objects, such as appliances, into the back of your truck, it may be better to buy a pickup crane bed.

Warning: You can be seriously injured by lifting heavy objects or falling off the ramp. Always use caution when lifting heavy objects.

What other ways are there to make the body heavier?

Spacers

Spacers are perhaps the most requested body tuning option. They’re simply mounted in regular places without any special modifications, to tie together the most loaded and movable body elements. These, as a rule, include suspension strut cups, attachment points for levers, and assemblies.

Parts for strengthening problematic units are made for the configuration of each specific car model. Most often, they resort to the front struts, which are subject to the maximum loads from the power unit, steering, and poor road surface.

The cost of such tuning is relatively low, and the result is noticeable immediately, especially if the car is no longer new, although additional amplifiers cannot replace the full repair of the old problematic body.

The advantages of this tuning option include the following:

easy assembly/disassembly;
affordable cost;
noticeable improvement in handling;
a large selection of spacers for all car models.

But, as with everything, the spacers have their drawbacks:

weighting the car too much;
take up space under the hood or in the cabin;
for worn bodies, spacers are only a temporary solution.

Integrated gain

Integrated reinforcement is meant to be modified without the use of additional parts. The essence of strengthening the body is to revise the factory parameters.

In particular, this can be reinforced with additional factory welded seams, the addition of duplicate layers of material at the attachment points of the units and levers. To strengthen the bending points of the standard metal and to protect against vibrations, jumpers and “kerchiefs” are used.

Integrated reinforcement is usually combined with body repair and is used to prepare cars for competition. The price is determined not by the details, but by the amount of work. Integrated reinforcement often involves partial disassembly of the vehicle and quality welding.

So, the advantages of this type of tuning include:

extends the service life of individual parts and the body as a whole;
doesn’t take up space under the hood or in the cabin.

The disadvantages of this

labor intensity;
relatively high cost;
violation of the deformation zones provided by the manufacturer.

Conclusion

So now you know the basic ways to weigh your truck body. We hope you don’t have to deal with poor road handling problems, and still, let these methods be useful to you.