DIY Dog Bed Platform In The Back Seat of A Truck
Updated May 17, 2021
When we first started to look for a replacement truck we were dead set on getting a truck with a crew cab. Main reason was because of the dogs. Our old truck was an extended cab which only has two doors and rear windows that don’t open. We really wanted Tybee and Tyki to have windows to stick their heads out of and squeezing Tybee into the back seat was a pain in the ass. In addition, we wanted to have more space in the back of the cab to store personal items. But after we spent a month not finding a crew cab truck we had to change our truck requirements or else we would be stuck in Washington for a long time. So we started to look at supercab trucks.
We were surprised by how much roomier the back of the supercab was than we expected. Having actual half back doors added a lot of space to the entrance when the front doors were also opened. Also the first supercab truck we looked at had back seats that folded flat – creating a good amount of space for the dogs.
What the back seats look like folded flat. We placed a dog car seat cover over it for protection.
Except with the back seats folded flat it meant we would lose floor space that could also be storage space. We came up with a great plan - we could build a platform on top of the folded back seats. The dogs would lay on top of the platform, raising them up higher inside the cab so they could look out the windows, and the entire space underneath the platform would be storage space for us!
Jerud's diagram of the dog platform and console.
Although we still feel really bad that the dogs don’t get real windows.
Building the dog bed platform was one of the first things we worked on getting our replacement truck ready for the road, along with moving our custom console from the old. Luckily for us, my aunt and uncle’s neighbors were having a garage added onto their house and there were a lot of discarded pieces of wood. We were able to salvage enough wood out of their pile that we didn’t have to spend any money on materials. Score! And my aunt and uncle had a jigsaw and sander that we could use. Double score!
Our plan was to make the platform as simple as possible:
Make the platform high enough so a helmet could fit in the space underneath it.
The width of the platform wouldn’t fill up the entire back seat; we left space behind the driver seat so the toolbox could fit.
Enough legs to hold up the platform while stabilizing it no matter where the dogs are laying.
The front of the platform would overlap with our DIY console (as it did in the previous truck) so the dogs could access and lay on the console.
The front half of the platform could flip up to give us easy access to the space underneath for storage.
The final platform came out to be 52 inches long, 7.5 inches tall, and 28 inches wide.
This piece of wood cut would be the actual platform.
Tyki chilling in our DIY console.
Cutting platform legs out of a 2x4.
We cut out individuals legs like this instead of using the 2x4 as a whole to save weight.
This is what the legs look like once in the truck. We rounded the bottom of the legs and taped it with felt pads to protect the cover underneath.
The wooden bar prevents the platform from shifting forward when we're driving.
What the finished platform looks like.
We put hinges on the two separate platform pieces so we could flip it up and easily access the front half of the storage space.
We added a divider to the platform to prevent bags from falling on top of the dogs.
There’s enough extra space on this side of the platform for some grocery bags.
You can see our DIY console in this photo.
The platform came out exactly as we hoped - except one thing, the dog beds on the platform add several inches to the overall height. This makes it difficult for us to put Tybee in because now we have to lift her up so high. But we couldn’t really decrease the height of the platform itself or else the space underneath wouldn’t be very usable.
Tyki gets in by jumping onto the front seat and walking over the console.
Tyki and Tybee have a pretty sweet ride in the truck.
