Some of you may recall I had been looking and finally picked up a V-10 truck. I had plans to throw a used dump insert into it if i could find one in good shape reasonably priced.

After a couple months of looking and not finding what I wanted, my buddy spied a hoist kit while we were walking thru a swap meet. I read up on these but had decided against it over the expense and no direct fit for my year truck. Plus the bed needed at ton of work to support it. But after talking to the seller and walking around another hour debating I went back and made him an offer. Got it cheap for something that was never used.

I never heard of Uni-hoist but it appears this was made in the mid to late '70's judging by the trucks shown in the manual. Instructions show how to install on on Ford, Chevy, or Dodge by using different brackets in the kit. I couldn't use really any of them. First hurdle was to repair my existing bed as I wasn't going to buy a good bed to experiment on. Fortunately a coworker had just swapped out a bed on his shorty and the floor was in good shape where mine was shot. So I cut his up to repair mine. The center of my bed is double floor so to speak.

One of the pitfalls in these kits is not enough support for heavy wet loads. So, I extended the support for the hoist bracket that attaches to the crossmembers.
I also had to fab up some sort of hinge brackets.I used the stock bed mounting plate and the hinge bolts thru the bumper hole on the frame.

I tested with a hoist to check for clearance with the hinges and from bed to cab. I had to make several adjustments to both.
The bed had to be moved back 1 inch from factory plus I still had to radius the corners.

Next on my list was to repair the wheel arches. I'd dreamt up this repair a long time ago but never had the opportunity to try it. It's based off all my other body fixes. Cut out bad metal, make patches, seal, pop rivet, then drown in bedliner.
I bought the panels from Mill Supply. Nice pieces. I then radiused them to the opening. I was hoping the bad metal was contained to around 4 inches but it went to 6! Had to use the whole panel. I prefer this fix over huge bushwacker flares with stock tires.

Once I got all the patch panels on I sprayed bedliner over it. I could't get the texture I wanted so I had to get a heavy nap roller and go over it.
And i can't make this image right side up for some reason.

Got the pump and reservoir mounted. I also reinforced the frame rails on both sides in this area.
I made a crossmember for the lift cylinder. I would have like to have moved it farther forward but the gas tank is in the way and I don't know of a smaller tank to fit a Gen 3.

Finally got it together last Thanksgiving.

Actually used it a few time this past summer.

Looks great Be sure you have extra shovels and rakes when friends come over...

Thanks, Roundup! For sure after the work they'll want refreshments!

I added a headache rack. The nerf bars are lowered 2 inches. You can see the bed is moved back an inch to clear.

Do you have any photos of the fuel filler tube?

I do not. You can see the cap in a pic of the frame . I basically cut out the curve in the stock filler neck and welded it back together. It comes very close to the bed floor.

I also wanted to tow occasionally so I modified the factory hitch to fit behind a rollpan and not interfere with bed or hinges.

This requires a custom ball mount about 3 inches longer and an old timey plate holder.