Raising the bed floor

[Drummerdad]

Im starting to look into raising the bed floor. I know some of you might hate this idea, and I understand. Im in a situation where the floor is gone anyway, and since the truck was lowered so much, it will just kill two birds with one stone. I dont like the humps.

My question is for those who have already raised the floor of their truck. As I understand it, the inner bed wall is the structure which supports the bed frame, which carries the weight of the truck. I understand how to make a frame higher in the bed. So I think I can just weld a frame to this inner bed wall, and make tall bed mounts. Does this sound correct? I noticed Slick cut his bed floor, sectioned it and welded it back in a higher position, I think. I would do almost the same, but where my floor is rotten, Ill weld square tubing along the inner wall making a frame. Then make mounts to secure the new bed frame to the truck frame. Then I can cut out the original cross supports.

Does that make sense? I think it does. Let me know what you all have done, or if Im going to completely screw something up doing this. Im just planning right now, but Im starting to look at getting the tubing.

[PwrWgnDrvr]

Why do u need to cut out the original crossmembers? Leave them in place, except where one might interfere with your notch, and build a new floor above it. That maintains the structural integrity of the bed and you can attach it to the frame using the original mount points.

[Drummerdad]

They are rotten also. Heavily pitted, full of holes and twisted and bent. I might be able to replace or rebuild the two on the end. The middle two are very rotten, and would need to be replaced. Ill see of I can get pictures. I might be over thinking it.

[Drummerdad]

It might be that what Im talking about is a body drop on the bed. The two terms seem to be synonymous, but I might not be thinking of the same thing. I have looked at tons of pictures, and it appears I can do it either way. Ill post some pictures of what I was talking about. But it might be better to leave those supports, or replace them with square beams, and build up the frame from that. I think I would be better off to make sure the foundation of the floor is safe and good, then build up. Or just build a new floor higher up.

The first picture is a radical raised floor, but it is close to what I was thinking.

The second one looks more like just a floor repair, but its close also.

[Drummerdad]

Just for reference, if anyone is looking, the supports are bent. I might be able to replace them. The two on the ends might be okay, but they are pitted pretty bad.