All Entries in the "Tundra Bed Liner" Category

Putting Toyota’s Big Loss In Perspective

If you’ve been paying attention to automotive news in the last week, you’ve undoubtedly heard that Toyota lost an obscene amount of money in the first quarter – $7.7 billion to be exact. Toyota was quick to point out that this loss is against a $3.3 billion profit in the previous three quarters, resulting in a $4.4 billion loss for the 2008 financial year. (NOTE: Toyota’s financial year ends after the first quarter.) Worst still, Toyota anticipates losing about $5.5 billion for the coming year.

Toyota’s Loss is Big, But Don’t Let Anyone Fool You
photo credit: Andres Rueda

In other words, Toyota lost a lot of money last year and they’re planning on losing a lot of money this year too. Considering the fact that Toyota hasn’t had an operating loss since 1950, this is a big deal. Toyota has taken sweeping action with tremendous production cuts, cost cutting measures, and most recently announcing that they’re going to fire half of their corporate management team.

However, before anyone starts worrying about “Toyota being the next GM,” here’s some perspective:

Popularity: 3%

Spray In Review: Line-X Bed Liner vs. Rhino Bed Liner

“Tastes Great!”
“Less Filling!”

Is kind of like…

“Line-X!”
“Rhino!”

If you have just bought a new truck, there’s a good chance that someone (a friend, a relative, or a salesperson) has told you to buy a certain brand of spray-in bed liner “because they’re the best”. If you’re like us, you don’t like making this decision without doing a little research first (Not sure you want a spray-in? See a full list of Bed Liner Options). Here’s our analysis of the two biggest names in spray-in truck bed liners.

Here are some things you should know about both brands:

1. INSTALLATION IS EVERYTHING. If you have a good installer, you’ll get a good liner. Find a good installer by asking your local Toyota dealer, RV dealer, off-road club, or by asking for references.
2. All spray-in liners fade when exposed to a few years of sunlight.
3. Be careful with color-matching. Unless you pay extra to protect the liner from UV, it will fade much faster than the factory paint and your liner and your truck won’t color-match after a couple of years. At least if you stick with black it will only fade to dark charcoal.
4. The mix used for either a Rhino or a Line-X is basically the same. There are some differences, but one isn’t substantially better than the other.
5. Both companies now offer nation-wide lifetime warranties on their products.
6. Expect your installation to cost somewhere between $300 and $400 dollars. Anything more should include extras like color matching, additional surface spraying, or special UV protectants. Anything less than that could indicate the installer you’re using is making a shortcut somewhere.
7. If you have any doubts about your installer, inspect their spray booth or spray area. If it’s dirty or messy, you should find someone else.
8. Add-on coatings should be considered appearance-enhancing only. Before paying your installer for extra UV protection, etc., consider do-it-yourself options like Armor All, Just Once, and 303 Protectant.

Now, in no particular order, the individual products:

Line-X

Line-x is applied “hot” using a high pressure system. Because Line-X is applied at high pressure, it tends to be thinner (about 1/4″ thick). Thinner is better when it comes to looks — a thin coating tends to follow every contour of your truck’s bed and preserves the factory appearance. One other aspect of the thin coating is that Line-X liners usually have a very rough surface that sparkles when new. Some people dislike the rough Line-x surface — it can be hard on the knees and it can damage your cargo (finished wood surfaces and Line-x liners don’t mix, for instance). While you can request that the installer reduce the roughness of the finish, this will also result in a surface that’s less glossy. Finally, because Line-X uses more polyurea, it is stronger and more tear resistant than Rhino.

Rhino

Rhino is applied cold with a low-pressure system. Because of the lower temperature and pressure, Rhino liners are thicker (3/8″ of an inch) than Line-X. The increased thickness of a Rhino gives it a softer “rubbery” feel, and the liner’s surface isn’t as rough as Line-X so it’s more gentle on knees and cargo. Rhino’s thicker coating also aids in sound deadening, and the surface seems to “grab” objects better than Line-X. But all of these benefits don’t come without sacrifice. Thicker material also means a poorer finish — Rhino material doesn’t follow the contours of a truck bed nearly as well as Line-X. The cold application also means longer curing times and a greater possibility of “runs” in the liner surface. Finally, it’s not uncommon to see inconsistencies in Rhino liner thickness, meaning some parts of your truck bed are more protected than others.

Informal Polls

While informal polls are far from scientific, they do give a good sense of what the online truck enthusiast community thinks about these two products.

Readers at TundraSolutions were asked to vote on the best spray-in bed liner, and Line-X won 252 votes to 60.

Readers at GMFullSize voted in a similar poll, and the tally is 65 in favor of the Line-X over 11 in favor of the the Rhino.

Finally, readers at FullSizeChevy.com also favored the Line-X over the Rhino, 255 to 79.

The Winner Is…

Line-X comes out ahead for a few reasons — Line-X liners are usually better looking than Rhino, are stronger, and Line-x installation quality tends to be higher (after all, Line-x offered a national warranty on their product years before Rhino). But that’s not to say that Rhino doesn’t have some compelling features. We really like the rubbery feel of the Rhino liner, and we think it is a better finished surface (at least as far as feel goes). In fact, if Rhino had the same reputation for quality as Line-X, this would have been a much more difficult decision.

Recently, in an effort to match Line-X, some Rhino installers have begun using high-pressure systems that will produce a better looking “Line-X” type surface. Rhino is also moving to match Line-X in other areas, from color matching to UV protectants. Rhino is also working on improving installer quality. We expect that the differences between these two will become smaller as time goes by.

As we’ve said before, the most important aspect of any spray-in bed liner is the person installing it. Make sure you find a reputable Line-X or Rhino dealer, and you should be happy with either.

Popularity: 38%

Toyota Tundra Truck Bed Liner Options

If you’re like most new Tundra owners, you’re seriously considering bed protection. Fortunately you have options — lots of them. Here are the highlights:

1) No Bed Liner. It’s cheap, it’s easy, and it could work out just fine. But while you may not ever intend to haul anything that would damage your truck’s bed, you never know when a situation will arise and you will be forced to put something back their that damages the paint job. If you’ve got scratches in your bed, your options for adding a bed liner later get more expensive. That’s because before you add any sort of removable liner you’ll need to re-protect the bed (i.e. re-paint) so that any moisture that gets caught between your bed and your liner won’t cause your bed to rust. If you’re leasing your truck, this might be your only option.

2) Rubber Bed Mat. It’s old-school but it certainly deserves consideration. There’s no disputing that a heavy piece of rubber will protect the bottom of your truck bed from gouges and scratcheswhile at the same time providing a surface that has more friction than the factory bed. If you’re considering adding a rubber mat, make sure you purchase one that is fairly thick. Thin rubber mats (anything less than 1/4″) tend to “roll-up” when you’re loading the bed, making them sort of hazardous. You should also make sure that the mat you buy has a knobby bottom surface so that moisture doesn’t get trapped under the mat and lead to premature bed rust. Finally, we like mats that are pre-cut to fit your truck. Those mats you have to trim yourself never fit right and they tend to be cheap anyways. The best feature of a nice rubber mat is that it will only cost you $75-$100.

3) Plastic Bed Liner. Plastic bed liners (or “drop-ins”) fit OK, install quickly and easily, and do a nice job of protecting the bed from most kinds of damage. Plastic bed liners are especially nice if you need to slide items in and out of your truck. Plastic also won’t scratch anything you put in your bed (like furniture), and it washes out quickly and easily. The biggest disadvantage to plastic drop-in liners is that whatever you have resting in your bed can slide around at any time. Plastic is slippery, especially when wet, and we’ve seen big loads shift (even when they were properly tied down). Also, it seems like a lot of moisture and gunk accumulates under the plastic liner, requiring you to remove it and clean the bed periodically. Plastic drop-in bed liners can cost as little as $250 or as much as $400.

4) Plastic Coatings. We’ve all seen the ads — send in $49.99 and they’ll send you a gallon of special “truck bed paint” just like the pros use. Get out your roller and paint brush and you can install your own “spray-in” like bed surface on a Saturday afternoon. Bulls#&t. Unless you have experience applying this stuff, you’re probably going to screw something up. Worse, it doesn’t always bond properly to the bed, meaning big hunks will flake off at the least helpful times. While we don’t want to condemn all of these products, we haven’t ever seen it work. Proceed at your own risk.

5) Spray-In. This is by far the most popular option, and for good reason. It’s the best looking and most durable bed liner there is. The bed is sprayed with a special polyurethane “paint” that protects the bed from scratches and chemicals. The coating is permanent, the texture is rough (which keeps things from sliding), and the material is nearly indestructible. In fact, unlike every other option listed here, a spray-in liner will last forever.

Lots of companies offer spray-in bed liners, but the top two are Line-X and Rhino. While you may hear lots of differing opinions about the two products, it’s fair to say that they’re basically the same stuff. However, the installers are not the same. In fact, any stories you hear about a bad Rhino or Line-X liner have more to do with the person that installed the liner than the product itself. The best way you can make sure you get a good spray-in liner is to find out how long the installer has been in business. If you have any doubts about them, get references and check them out. Your local Toyota dealer is also an excellent place to get a recommendation for a good installer. You should be able to get a quality spray-in liner with a lifetime warranty installed for $300-$400 (under rail). Over the rail should add about $50. There are other names out their in spray-ins, and we’re sure that some of them are just fine, but they’re not usually any cheaper than Line-X or Rhino so we don’t recommend them.

6) Carpet Liner. The carpet liner is usually a strong outdoor carpet with a thick rubber or vinyl backing. They’re surprisingly strong and they have the benefit of being soft. They’re especially popular with people that are going to add a camper shell to their truck. The biggest advantage to them, in addition to being plush, is that they’re removable. If you like the idea of being able to see your factory finish whenever you want to, this might be a good option for you. Cost is about the same as a good plastic bed-liner, about $350. The only thing we don’t like about these is that they don’t seem to stay attached, but that probably has to do with the way they’re installed.

You can also add plywood to your truck bed, and there are some cool commercial roll-up systems that literally unload your truck for you (like Load Handler).

Have an opinion about Tundra bed liner options? Share it!

Popularity: 12%