Loose Tailgate, No Longer Securely Latches In Place On My Trailhunter- UPDATE- NON warranty issue.

[Independence Overland]

UPDATE: See Below

After doing a 100 mile off road trek in my Tacoma, the tailgate no longer securely latches in place. It has a fair bit of play, enough that if someone were behind me on a trail they would notice my tailgate shaking. I tried several different things to get it to latch correctly with no luck. I hate the auto tailgate as it is, and it will be removed soon when I install a camper but I will still have it fixed since its under warranty.

Sometimes when it shuts, it will latch correctly for a split second and then it releases again. I have an appointment next week.

 

[rustytaco]

Man... seems like a lot of issues popping up. We'll see what the dealer says. Hopefully they don't give you a hard time. Seems like a tough thing to deny though. I think @Riley_monthule had some tailgate issues too? Any updates there? I don't recall the solution, etc. I think his wasn't closing. Or the button wasn't working.

 

[Independence Overland]

Part of the reason I did PPF on the truck, was so if I need to sell it a few years after ownership I can a little easier. I was fully aware this kind of stuff would happen during the first few years. If it ends up being a problem child over time, I will pull all of my parts and get another truck here in another 3 years or so and hopefully the kinks will be worked out by then. Plus I am sure the new colors will be calling me by then

 

[Riley_monthule]

Part of the reason I did PPF on the truck, was so if I need to sell it a few years after ownership I can a little easier. I was fully aware this kind of stuff would happen during the first few years. If it ends up being a problem child over time, I will pull all of my parts and get another truck here in another 3 years or so and hopefully the kinks will be worked out by then. Plus I am sure the new colors will be calling me by then

I'm currently working on a video but I found a solution thanks to Code3trd on instagram! So with your tailgate down right next to the latch there are these rubber stops that keep the tailgate tight after it latches. Welllll...... they're too big. They seem to work when the truck is fresh off the lot but after some good trails and vibrations things move a couple millimeters and the tailgate no longer latches correctly. Seems like the motor in the auto gate isn't strong enough to detach the latch once those rubber stops put too much pressure on it. I took those two rubber stops out one on each side and my tailgate works like a dream now and even sounds much better when unlatching. This of course means there's now too big of a gap and the tailgate can move back and forth a little but for now it's much better to have it working with a little movement rather than it always having problems.

So... you can for at least the meantime take those rubber stops out, see if it fixes your problem and then shave/cut them down until the tailgate works properly again. Or just leave them out like I'm currently doing. I'm also looking into 3d printing some correctly sized stops. Let me know if that helps!

O yeah! I wouldn't waste your time going to the dealer if that's all you're going in for. I've talked with a couple people on this and all they do is reset the system as there's no TSB out for it yet. Well I guess maybe if the rubber stop thing doesn't work it still might be worth going in but I'm pretty confident that'll fix your issue.

 

[Independence Overland]

Okay so turns out this was not a warranty issue. I did a good inspection on this thing before taking it in, and honestly I fee like a dumbass now. I have a Mountain Hatch tailgate insert. I double checked and made sure everything was good and nothing was touching. I couldnt find anything obvious.

So on the tailgate for the auto tailgates, there is a little bump stop. My Mountain Hatch insert need to be extended to actually hit that bumpstop, as it applies a little bit of back pressure for the tailgate to lock up correctly. Something I totally over looked when doing my personal inspection. I got with Mountain Hatch about it, so they will be correcting their design for this issue.