Bestop TrekStep - Rear Mounted Truck Step - Aluminum - Driver Side

Video Transcript for Bestop TrekStep Rear Mounted Truck Step Installation - 2022 Ram 1500

Hey everybody, Ryan here at etrailer. Today on our 2022 Ram 1500, we're gonna be checking out and showing you how to install the best stop rear-mounted truck step. Now, these are available for the passenger's side like we have here today, and they're also available for the driver's side as well. When it comes to the ram trucks, nowadays, you know, they're pretty big. That kinda holds true for all the manufacturers. They're getting higher and higher up off the ground.

So having a step can really help a lot of people out, being able to get in and out of the back, or just look in there. And that's where something like this is gonna come into play. Whenever you're ready to use it, it just swings down, and actually gives you a pretty good platform that way you're able to kind of stand on it, and take a look inside the back. Or, you know, what I would probably use it for is a little bit of help getting in and out. So you drop tailgate down kind of gives you a spot to the hike up there and get whatever you might need in and out of the back.

And once you're done actually using the step, you know you're getting ready to hop in and hit the road. All you're gonna have to do is kind of help it up a little bit. It's kind of spring loaded almost I guess you could call it. And it holds itself back up into position tight against your bottom bumper. You know, when it comes to picking an auto-step, I'm sure a lot of people have seen the ones that go into your hitch, all right And those are fine in some scenarios.

To me I think they kind of look a little goofy that's my opinion but they're not the most practical either. 'Cause I mean, if you think about it if you have a a step in the head chair and you drop your tailgate it's not really helping you get it in or out, right 'Cause really the only thing it's gonna help you do is look over it. So if I was putting a step on, I'd want a little more function personally. Not to mention too if you tow a lot, it's just something you're gonna have to constantly put in and out of the back of your ram. So good option for some people.

I think this one is definitely a better option for most people out there though. And like I said before, you know you have your passenger's side one, can also get the driver's side. So kind of whatever you prefer there. And I mean other than that, it's actually a pretty nice piece. I was really surprised on how heavy it was and how well made it was. So why don't we just kind of take a a little closer look here So the actual step is gonna be made from aluminum. So you're not gonna have to worry about it rusting out or anything like that, which I think is important especially since this moves around you know, if things start getting rusted then kind of defeats the purpose of it if it's a big pain to use, right So definitely a good thing there. The platform itself has some bridges in it. Pretty solid, kinda has almost like some grip tape on there. Probably help, you know make sure you get a good footing on it. And it's relatively large in size you know, about perfect to my opinion just kind of for a reference I got a size 10 and a half boot and, you know easily get your foot up there. You know, pretty good deal there. And you know, it comes down a pretty good amount. It's definitely manageable. And matter of fact we'll just see how much on this particular truck here. So this is a ram limited four by four. I don't know if that makes a difference, but we'll just go from right there to the bottom of our bumper looks like it's gonna be about seven and a half inches. And this up right position sits up pretty tight. They do give you spacers and stuff that you can use that'll drop this down a little bit more. I thought this is perfect 'cause we got this corner here to kind of get her foot on. So I wanted to keep it as tight as I could. And in that position, kinda tough to measure. right here it's only about a three quarter inch gap something like that. So sets-up tight, isn't super noticeable, but still pretty easy to use. Something that I do think is worth mentioning as well they make steps very similar to the one we have here in our truck today. But ones that you can put kind of here in this area like on the side. So if you happen to have a toolbox, or anything like that in your truck, you know you're able to flip that one down and kind of give you a good vintage point and access point over here too. So I just thought that was worth mentioning, but you know I mean, other than that, at the end of the day, if you're looking for a step that's gonna help make your felt a little bit easier and you want something that looks good and functions good definitely an option I'd think about. As far as getting it installed it was much easier than I thought it would be. Honestly, I really wasn't sure what to think. I've never done one of these before. But essentially you take off two nuts from your bumper, back bumper super easy to get to. Kind of assemble the whole step and just put it up there and bolt it up. I mean it was super straightforward and not really difficult at all, but if you'd like to see how I did that feel free to follow along. We'll go ahead and install the stuff together now. To begin our installation, we're gonna be here at the back of our truck on the side and we're gonna be working kind of just behind our bumper right here in this area kind of next to our tailpipe. So if you look in that area that I talked about we're gonna have two nuts that we need to remove and we're gonna be using these as our attachment points for our step. So you're gonna take a 16 millimeter socket and pull them both off. This point we can kind of start to assemble everything. So we have the main body here. First step, you'll be mounting brackets. You're gonna take the mounting bracket, holes in editor are gonna line up with the holes in the step. Gonna take these bolts. So there's some that are longer. Some that are shorter. The longer ones are there if you have to put a spacer in between these two parts, I don't think we'll have to so we'll try this first, where you take your shorter bolt flat washer gonna get both these started and start at hand tight. I'll come back with the 16 millimeter socket and start them down. And then while we're right here I think it'll be easier to get our step loosely installed while we have it on the tailgate. So I'm going to kind of click that open. And you can see that groove there there's a couple of holes in it. Those are gonna line up with our step. So I kinda lay this like so trying to view this in a way where we can see. If you grab the step you're gonna have this piece that slides around and it's threaded, all right And so you're gonna take it and essentially kind of drop it in there, and then you can move it around until it lines up. Then you're gonna take these Allen key bolts. I'm not gonna tighten these down yet. I'm just gonna get 'em started hand tight, that way If we need to kind of adjust it, we still can. Now back underneath the truck we can take our step assembly here Slide that over our attachment points. Gonna take the factory nuts and get both of these started. And from there, I'll just go ahead and tighten it back down. So now we're able to actually adjust our step. Really not a whole lot of adjustment here. I think it'll be best just going all the way over and that way it'll kind of hang out a little bit, you know, give you a spot to kind of put your foot and push this down. If you think it's too tight against the bottom of your truck maybe you have a, you know, big foot or something, you can always take those spacers that we talked about. And when you put them in, that'll actually kind of drop this down a little bit lower, give you more room there. So kind of whatever your preference is. But I think we're in good shape here. So I'm gonna take an Allen key and get both these hand tight. I'll come back and snug them down a little bit. So now moment of truth. We wanna test us out, right So go ahead and swing this down. Feels pretty good. I think everything's solid. And we're good to go. With that said, if you happen to pick up one for the driver's side you'd simply just repeat the same process over there 'cause it'll be set up the exact same way. And that'll finish up or look up into our installation of the best stop rear-mounted truck step on our 2022 Ram 1500..