Truck Bed Cover Ideas

[wyatt]

I have had an idea for a bed cover for a while, but now that I know how to use Google SketchUp well enough to make poor drawings, I don't feel as bad posting my ideas.


Basicly a typical truck looks like this.


Most of the bed covers that people look into making look like this, or aren't even tapered at the end.


What I am thinking looks more like this. With the tail gate down there would be a lot less trailing edge.


Or with the "fins" tapered down. Obviously the fin tapers would have to be clear for the tail lights.

Is there a reason for not doing this? The reasons I can think of are:

• The amount of volume is reduced.
• There may be additional turbulence created by the "fins".
• The angle may be too steep depending on truck

Are there others that I'm just not thinking of? I know Phil Knox didn't do this, so I figure there must be a reason. I don't have a truck to do this on, but I suggested it to my dad and he said it would be too much hassle to get in and out, so he wanted nothing to do with it... but I thought maybe someone else would.

[SVOboy]

What kind of angle would that make? I think the only problem is that the angle might be too steep, but it's a great idea!

[McTimson]

It looks like it would be tough to actually use the bed of the truck. With the 'traditional' design, you can open the tailgate to get access, with your design, you would need to make a hatch type of door onto the back, and it looks like it might be tricky to reach stuff at the end of the bed with that setup.

It looks pretty cool though, like a concept car with crazy fins at the end.

[Frank Lee]

Add some style and you have this:



Truckzilla?

[MetroMPG]

Wow. Lovely car, that one, Frank.

---

I suspect even with a long bed, the angle would be too great to keep attached flow, even if the transition at the cab roof end were more gradual.

Where's Ben Nelson. He had a REALLY good & novel aeroshell idea, but I think I promised not to tell anyone. Come on, Ben - spill the beans!

[hummingbird]

Originally Posted by McTimson

It looks like it would be tough to actually use the bed of the truck. With the 'traditional' design, you can open the tailgate to get access, with your design, you would need to make a hatch type of door onto the back, and it looks like it might be tricky to reach stuff at the end of the bed with that setup.

Not really - If you get this made out of ribbed metal sheet, with each flat surface separate, and the sloping surface hinged at the top edge - like basjoos' plexi, opening up wide and supported by some sort of a rod / hydraulic spring (or whatever it is called) in the widest position.

[wyatt]

PIMP car! I wasn't even sure what I was looking at right away due to the mirror finish, but I would definitely feel cool driving it.

Basically I imagined a "final" version to be hinged at the top like said above... basically the entire flat area would be liftable, with some sort of lift assist. It may not be practical for many reasons (the tailgait may bounce freely and cause problems. It may require windows too... Just an idea that could be expanded on by anyone.

As for the question of whether it would maintain flow or not, that's another question (and my third bullet for why it may not work), and would be heavily dependent on the truck you are using. The short bed trucks would probably never work, but I would imagine most full size beds would be under that magical 15 degree angle. Even if you had to have the back end raised up a few inches to keep the 15 degrees, it just gives you a bit more length to boat tail the truck.

[wyatt]

A tonneau cover based idea...


Take your basic tonneau cover, as shown above...


Build an extension on the truck bed sides that slopes to the end of the bed. Also, you will need to build a "bridge" to fill in the gap to the back of the cab.


The tonneau cover can still open as before, giving access to the bed of the truck.


From the side, you can see that there is an arc built into the bridge, allowing a smooth transition.

My 3D model isn't the best, and neglects lots of things like space for the cover to open without contacting, but you get the general idea. Also I will point out that the cab in the first picture has (heavily) tapered sides, and the following ones do not. It should be easy to put windows on the sides and the portion behind the cab to allow viewing out the sides. Although I had this as an "epiphany", I know there is a very professionally done one out there somewhere that looks just like this, and I didn't even think of it until I had it drawn up and said "this looks very familiar". Does this seem feasible to folks?

[MetroMPG]

Feasible, and... already built by Bondo, as you remembered:

Commercially produced aerodynamic pickup bed cap

Have a look through his thread: swiss army knife of aeroshells.

[aerohead]

Wyatt,it's hard to tell true-length and actual angles from an orthogonal projection as in your renderings.So it's hard to figure if you'd have flow separation down the back slope of the cover.Metro MPG put a template together for his permanent Kamm back project,that represents a generic teardrop shape that we think is a good starting point for design.---------------------------------------------------------- If you can rotate your image until it represents a side view of the pickup,it would allow you to place it under the template and see if your angles are within the margins.----------------------------------------------------------- If the cover descends at a steep angle,the flow will separate and you'll lose the benefit of the cover.If you can find your way to the Phil Knox aerodynamic photos in the archive,there you'll find a photo of the famous Kamm K-Car,taken in Volkswagen's windtunnel.From the smoke trace over the roof of the car,you'll be able to see the "perfect" contour up to about the last foot or so,where you can see the air separate as the roofline rolls more steeply down.If you mimic this contour,you're home free!