HDPE Bed Mounted Rack

[CavTrooper]

I was doing some thinking today and am considering on looking to see what it would cost me to fabricate a bed rack out of HDPE pipe. All the fittings and equipment are available its just getting a good deal on the materials. Due to the properties of HDPE it would never have to be maintained as other racks available on the market and hopefully the weight would be kept down as well. Any thoughts?

 

[nat]

BAD idea. Sorry.

HDPE has a yield strength that is only 1/50 of steel, it isn't even as strong as PVC.

 

[Montana Cruiser]

CavTrooper, I think you should look at other materials. HDPE pipe is not intended for applications like a rack, its got lots of great applications, but a load bearing rack isn't one of them. I'm not sure if you have looked at any of the data sheets or not, but that could be misleading, I'm in the industry, so I can understand why. What kind of load are you looking to carry with your bed rack?

PS ... I'm from Missoula, are you as well?

 

[wingysataday]

What about conduit? You could probably do a cheap rack with that stuff?

 

[keezer37]

What about conduit? You could probably do a cheap rack with that stuff?

You'd need rigid steel conduit to give it any strength. And there you're cutting, bending (buy a bender), and threading (buy a threader$$$) or you could try EMT (thin walled) which is easier to work with but you'd probably need to know a good deal about structural engineering to keep shifting loads from causing it to collapse.

I could imagine what your insurer might say about this idea. Purchasing someone else's product deflects some of the liability. Homemade, it's all on you.

 

[Revco]

If you want it to be lightweight, build it in Aluminum. If you can't fabricate/weld aluminum, have someone else do it for you. EMT Conduit is too thin for a bed rack, but it's ok for a roof rack. Plastic pipe is a no go. I've built mine from Aluminum, in a similar design as BoxRocket's. It's completely finish welded but I have some mounts to add and some cleaning up to do before I powdercoat it. It has full length feet running down the bed sides, 4 legs, and a 36"x36" base, all made from angle and sq/rect tubing and it's strong enough to park my truck on top of. It weighs 18lbs.

 

[CavTrooper]

Yes I am PM some time and we could meet up!

 

[CavTrooper]

Yep, PM me sometime!