Early Dakota Bed Rails

[DansGreyMj]

i was going thru a drive thru today and saw a boxy dakota and the bed rails looked very similar to an mj and i was wondering if anyone here owns an early dakota that can take some measurements of the rails to see if dakota caps would fit and mj

[dfreeman616]

i could manage that, i've got a 92 dakota ext cab sitting around.

[Eagle]

An early member of NAXJA who used to post as ComancheGuy said his father was a cap dealer. He reported that early S-10 caps fit. I have an S-10 shortie cap on one of my MJs right now. It's a perfect fit. ComancheGuy said the height was slightly off, but the one I have is a commercial/utility type that's about 6" or 8" taller than the cab anyway, so it isn't an issue.

[feerocknok]

You're talking about the caps as in a canopy, or bed rail caps?

[DansGreyMj]

bed rail caps

[jpdriver1]

for my long bed, I took a set of full sized chevy caps and cut them to fit

[Pathkiller]

Hi Eagle!

I'm the former ComancheGuy. Long time since those early NAXJA days.

 

My MJ has been in storage in Missouri for 3 years since I moved to DC for work. I'm driving it back here in 3 weeks at Christmas.

 

Regarding camper shells (toppers, caps, whatever they are called locally), Eagle has a great memory. Dimensionally, the shortbed MJ is the same length and width as an S-10 or Ranger. I ran a camper shell from an S-10 on my MJ for a while and it fit perfectly everywhere except the height was about 1/2" or 3/4" shorter than the back of the cab. Still looked fine though.

 

Some Toyota's have the same dimensions as well, although back at the time my family was in the industry Toyota had about 5-6 different variations in bed dimensions and we pretty much had to custom fit each camper shell to each truck. They varied in length by as much as an inch or two.

 

If you measure your truck for a shell, measure outside to outside width of the bed rails, then measure length from the front edge of the front bed lip to the back edge of the top of the tailgate.

 

 

Oddly enough, since this topic originally asked about Dakotas, the longbed Dakota camper was a perfect fit on fullsize Jeep pickups J-10, etc. My dad ran one on his 73 J-4000.

[ejndssn]

here is a thought didn't the early "i snooze u" p'up trucks have the correct dementions as our MJ :dunno:

[Pathkiller]

here is a thought didn't the early "i snooze u" p'up trucks have the correct dementions as our MJ :dunno:

 

Maybe, but what's more rare? An MJ or an early Isuzu? I don't recall seeing many Isuzu's running around with camper shells.

[HOrnbrod]

Here are the exact measurements for the early S10 LWB bed vs. the MJ. The SWB specs are proportionally similar, 12" shorter. I ran an S10 cap for about six months until I found a regulation MJ cap. Fits well around the bed, but is about 3" lower than the MJ roof.

 

BTW, anyone need a nearly new LWB S10 A.R.E. cap for their MJ? (2nd pic)

 

 

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[dragonrider477]

hey,i am interested in the cap you have sale.i am in e tennessee.could you pm me with your asking price and phone #.thanks.

[HOrnbrod]

hey,i am interested in the cap you have sale.i am in e tennessee.could you pm me with your asking price and phone #.thanks.

 

PM sent.

[702_MJ]

Well since the subject is on dakota's and mj's. Would a roll bar from a long bed dakota fit a lwb comanche? Not to be off subject or anything but i havent been able to get an opinion out of anyone.