Truck and van beds are handy for transporting equipment and gear. Whether you’re bringing things to your next job or going on a camping trip, your vehicle will need to carry a lot. However, factory models don’t give you much to work with, which is where aftermarket modifications come in handy. A good investment into the proper modification can make your vehicle carry a ton more than before. However, the trick to purchasing these modifications is finding the right one for your needs, which is why this will cover why bed slides are better than deck drawers and other options out there.
What Are Deck Drawers?
Deck drawers are a modification you can install on almost any vehicle deck to add more storage to your vehicle. These sit in your truck with a flat platform on top and function like a drawer you might see in a desk or cabinet. You slide them out to access the storage space where you can keep various tools and equipment.
What Are Bed Slides?
Bed slides are like trays that sit in your vehicle bed. They slide out from your vehicle’s bed or cargo area, transforming your entire vehicle’s bed into a drawer you can quickly access and use. There are a lot of variances between models and designs, but typically they cover the whole bed and slide outwards.
The Benefits of Bed Slides Over Deck Drawers
Although both modifications can be helpful and are much better than a standard vehicle off the factory floor, a bed slide provides many more benefits for vehicles overall. Here’s a look at five reasons why bed slides are better than deck drawers when it comes to vehicle modifications.
Easy Loading and Unloading
The most significant reason bed slides are more popular than deck drawers is the ease of storing and unloading equipment. Bed slides effectively move everything in your bed outside the vehicle, giving you easy access to the entire area without having to reach into the vehicle. This makes optimization easy as you have a lot more room to navigate the area without the walls of the bed or trunk getting in the way. You can reach the back of the storage area as easily as the front when you pull the slide out.
Improves Everyone’s Safety
Bed slides make loading more accessible and safer because of the large aluminum storage tray’s easy access. A good bed slide doesn’t make you stretch far into your vehicle and will put all the gear at a good height. This makes storage much safer as you lower the risk of lifting heavy items from awkward angles or overburdening your body. This is extremely useful for businesses and individuals when transporting a lot of gear or heavy items.
Great Space Utilization
While deck drawers add a bit more room to your vehicle, they do little to help you efficiently utilize the space you have. In addition, the drawers have a set width and height, so they won’t be able to store items bigger than the drawers. The biggest problem with a lot of heavy-duty vehicles isn’t the lack of storage space but the inability to effectively use all the space you have. With easy access to every part of your storage space, you can optimize the storage of all your items in your area and eliminate dead space while safely packing everything away.
Better Weight Distribution
One of the great benefits of a good bed slide is how it distributes the weight of your gear across the bed. Deck drawers can’t hold as much weight. Heavier weight gear can damage the deck drawers, while bed slides can carry thousands of pounds.
Can Carry Larger Items
The last of the five reasons bed slides are superior to deck drawers is that you can carry much more on a bed slide over the deck drawers. Deck drawers have a factory-determined drawer size, and the back of the drawers do not extend past the tailgate, let alone the taillights. Their predetermined size limits how much they can carry, while the bed slides are the same size as your bed and can even have a custom-built cargo carrier added to them to help you utilize a lot more space. This makes it great for holding smaller items and huge pieces of equipment you can’t carry in the smaller deck drawers.
Our Bed Slides
While these are the general benefits of using a bed slide, plenty of bed slides offer a lot more. A great example of this is all the benefits of our custom bed slides that we offer for anyone who needs one for their vehicle.
Custom Designs for Personalized Use
A custom bed slide is a unique tool you can use that no one else will have. A bed slide with a custom cargo carrier can be as simple as a sliding tray for bigger equipment like welders, generators, compressors, or tanks, or contain many other storage solutions, from drawers to compartments to hold all your tools or gear. You can even get specialty storage solutions for the specific equipment you need to store or use, like traffic cone storage or useable dry-erase worktables. Your custom bed slide can hold whatever you need.
Quick Installation
One benefit many people don’t consider is how long it takes to install one of these modifications. A long installation takes your vehicle out of commission and costs you time and money. Quick and easy installation in only a couple of hours is essential for modifications and can save a lot of time when installing bed slides on multiple vehicles or fleets.
Over 110% Extension
Our bed slides offer over 110 percent extension of your bed, Extension Past the Taillights™, which means you can fully access every part of your storage area. Many bed slides aim for 100 percent or less, limiting your access to the back of the bed slide. However, by extending over 110 percent, you can easily access these areas, have slide-out trays or drawers on the cab end, and fully utilize your storage space.
This is everything you should know when deciding which storage solution you should get for your vehicles. Although deck drawers have their place and can add on some storage, they don’t do as much for your vehicle as a good bed slide.
