I don’t want water accumulation in my dump truck bed. Parking it uphill makes some sense but water still accumulating at the tailgate. So I have it propped open with a stick since I rarely use it. Does this make sense or should I do something else?
The stick.
That's a pretty tight gate if it'll actually seal water in. I've only ever seen that on a brand new box. You can also put the box up a little and throw a block under it for safety. Some guys park them on the safety prop.
Just now finished welding several patches in ours up near the hoist ‘tower’ no one ever bothered to shovel out the packed mud and it rusted out nicely! Our tailgate definitely won’t hold back water The yard has a slope so park there in the winter.
Ah the sound of a fleet of trucks putting their boxes up on a Monday morning after a rainy weekend. If you leave the box up, don't allow the first segment joint to be exposed. We've had trouble with water getting in and freezing. It's not going to rust the box out unless you plan on sitting for years. Our boxes are heated and the sills under the floor lay full of water from condensation all the time, and I have never seen one rust through. Even in dry weather, water comes out by the hinge pins every time you dump
A bit off topic but this thread reminded me of a problem we had years ago with a brand new ten wheeler Mack dump truck. We got about six new Macks and new Heil hoists and dump bodies in to be assembled then ship out to various quarries. After we assembled each one we would test them by hauling a load or two of stone to one of our stock piles. One time took one of the trucks and got a good load of stone and hauled it over to the stock pile, backed up and put PTO in gear and put hoist into raise position. Just as box started to move there was a bang and it stopped moving. Lucky I jabbed the clutch fast and put PTO out of gear. Got out and took a look and the truck to see the hoist cylinder starting to come out the top of the dump body. Seems that at the factory that built the bodies someone just tacked in the top mounts for the hoist cylinder just as the lunch break bell rang or it was the Friday go home bell! Just glad we didn't let some brain dead driver take it for the first run or else I'm sure that cylinder would have kept going up till it destroyed the cylinder. As it was only had to straighten the top cover and actually weld the mounts in place and replace the grease hose to the upper pin.