Truck Tailgate Seals & Gaskets

Installing a tonneau cover, truck cap, or bed topper over the bed of your pickup without sealing the tailgate is like insulating the walls and attic of your home without doing the front door. You wouldn’t think of doing the latter, but the former is all too common. The gaps around the perimeter of your tailgate can allow dust, dirt, rain, and snow to enter the bed, and possibly cause damage to the bed and your cargo.

If you crawled inside a truck bed with a tonneau cover installed, you’d see plenty of light showing between the tailgate and the floor and sides of your truck bed. That light shows how large the gaps are between the tailgate and bed, gaps through which dirt and the elements can intrude. But as if that’s not enough opportunity to cause damage, some trucks come from the factory with holes in the bed and gaps in other areas where moisture and dust can enter.

Some Jeeps and SUVs can also suffer from tailgate gap problems. While these vehicles are generally equipped with seals and weatherstripping from the factory, over time these can compress and harden, becoming inflexible and unable to properly seal the tailgate to the body and hard top. They can also crack, and become worn, torn, and detached from regular vehicle use. Because the tailgates on these vehicles open into the passenger compartment, such flaws can cause wind noise and uncomfortable drafts, and moisture from rain and snow can ruin carpets as well as cargo.

Many pickup owners think that installing a tonneau cover or bed cap will provide enough protection from the elements for their cargo. But all it takes is a drive through a rain storm or past dirt fields on a windy day to dispel that assumption. When they drop the tailgate upon arriving at their destination they find damp and soggy cargo that wasn’t supposed to get wet, or dust and dirt covered cargo that was supposed to remain clean.

Thankfully, no matter what kind of pickup you drive, a protected truck bed and cargo are only a few dollars and a few minutes away. Our universal fit tailgate seals and gaskets will effectively fill the gaps between your tailgate and truck bed, and along with your tonneau or cap, create a protected enclosure impervious to the intrusion of dirt and moisture. These seals and gaskets are inexpensive, easy to install, and require no modifications to your truck for attachment. They come in kits with enough sealing material to weatherproof one truck, or in bulk rolls with enough to seal multiple trucks.

Complete instructions are supplied with the product, but in general, the seal installs in a continuous length and trimmed to fit with scissors or utility knife. The seal is affixed with pre-installed adhesive that comes covered with a liner that is removed during installation. The area of the bed where the seal will be mounted must be thoroughly cleaned with soap and water and then prepped with the included alcohol pads. As the seal is applied, the liner is peeled back to expose the adhesive, which makes a secure attachment as the seal is pressed in place.

Along with universal fit seals and gaskets, we also offer a total bed seal kit specifically designed for 2007-2018 GM Silverado/Sierra pickups. This seal kit includes tailgate seals, a seal for the junction of the front bed panel and the bed floor and sides, foam blocks for under the bed rails, and covers for drain holes in the bed floor. The kit was designed to solve the bed sealing requirements of these trucks, and with proper application will make the bed weatherproof with a tonneau cover or bed cap. And if you find that moisture is getting past the front of your tonneau cover into the bed, we have a seal for the top of the front bed rail to seal under the cover’s front bar.

Although at first glance they may appear the same, don’t confuse our tailgate seals and gaskets with ordinary bulk weatherstripping. Many of these seals were specially developed by the same manufacturers of the tonneau covers we offer, so they know what’s required for a product to seal and remain durable in any kind of weather. The seals and gaskets on our digital shelves have just the right amount of compressibility to form a tight seal, without ever becoming stiff and inflexible, which could allow gaps to develop where moisture and dirt could gain access.

If you’re a Jeep or SUV owner with tailgate sealing woes, we haven’t forgotten you. In addition to the above mentioned products, we have tailgate seals and weatherstrip kits for many Jeep and SUV applications. Unlike our universal fit tailgate seals for pickups, these products are specifically designed for each application, and they’re a direct fit replacement for original equipment seals and weatherstrip. Accordingly, they usually have a particular cross-section profile, and may have molded ends and built-in fasteners, as required. With these products you can make your Jeep or SUV weathertight.