Tailgate hinges rust and the gate drops
Owner reports filed with the United States road safety agency include rear door hinges corroding badly enough to need replacing. There are two of them and both are from one model year, so the fitment above is narrowed to that year rather than spread across the generation — the same rule applied elsewhere in this set, and the same caveat: if your truck is an adjacent year the inspection below still costs nothing, but nothing here claims your year is affected. The buyer's guide cited alongside establishes that these bodies rot at the arches, sills and mounts; it does not mention hinges, and is not the source for them. It is a small fault next to most of what is on this site, and it earns its place because of what it tells you rather than what it costs. The tailgate carries a heavy spare wheel on a side-hinged door, and those hinges are bolted to a panel that sits at the back of the truck collecting everything the rear wheels throw at it. When the hinges have gone, the water that killed them has been sitting there for years, which means the panel behind them and the bottom of the gate itself are worth looking at before anyone orders parts. The trap is ordering hinges for a truck whose problem is the panel they bolt to: new hinges on soft metal sag again in a season and the money is gone. There is a genuinely cheap version of this and it is worth trying first — a gate that has dropped a little often latches again after the striker is adjusted, and a gate whose drains are clear stops feeding the rust that started all of it.
Gen 21996–1996USWorks worseCommunity consensus
Drive normallyManeje normalmente
filteredDoes not fit the vehicle you selected
Provisional matchMatched on generation, market, year and engine only. Entries marked provisional also depend on something you have not told us, so some of them will not fit your truck. Narrowing your selection removes the mark.
Community consensus. This entry is not backed by factory documentation — treat its values and steps as a starting point, not as if they came from the factory manual.
Consenso de la comunidad. Esta entrada no se apoya en documentación de fábrica — tome los valores y los pasos como punto de partida, no como si vinieran del manual de fábrica.
Symptoms
- The tailgate drops at the outer edge as it swings open
- The gate has to be lifted before it will latch
- Rust staining and flaking around the hinges and their bolts
- The gate rattles on rough roads and lets water or dust into the load space
- The gap around the closed gate is no longer even from top to bottom
Likely causes
- Corroded tailgate hinges
- Corroded panel the hinges bolt to
- Worn or misadjusted latch and striker
- Blocked drains in the bottom of the gate
Diagnostic steps
- Take the weight of the open gate on your hands or a support and watch each hinge for movement, wear at the pin and flaking around the knucklePoints toCorroded tailgate hingesRules outWorn or misadjusted latch and striker
- Press firmly around the panel the hinges bolt to, inside and out, and feel for metal that flexes or crumbles rather than resistingPoints toCorroded panel the hinges bolt toRules outCorroded tailgate hinges
- Close the gate on a strip of paper at several points around the seal and compare how hard each one is to pull outPoints toWorn or misadjusted latch and strikerRules outCorroded panel the hinges bolt to
- Find the drain holes in the bottom edge of the gate, clear them, and pour water in at the top to prove it runs outPoints toBlocked drains in the bottom of the gateRules outWorn or misadjusted latch and striker
Fix paths
Replace the tailgate hinges
$$Difficulty 3/5
Straightforward once the panel behind them is known to be sound. Support the gate before the last bolt comes out — it is heavy with a spare wheel on it, and it will go somewhere unhelpful the moment it is free.
Repair the hinge mounting panel before fitting hinges
$$$Difficulty 5/5
If the panel is soft, hinges are not the repair. Rotten metal is cut out and replaced with new before anything is bolted to it, because a hinge is only as good as what it is bolted through.
Adjust or replace the latch and striker
$Difficulty 2/5
The cheapest thing to try, and it fixes a surprising number of gates that have only dropped a little. Adjust the striker rather than forcing the gate, and check the seal is seating evenly afterwards.
Clear the drains and seal the gate
$Difficulty 1/5
Free, and it is what stops this coming back. Water standing inside the gate is what rots it from the inside, and a gate that drains dries out between showers instead of living wet.