How to Build a Dog Box for your Truck
If you own a pickup truck and a dog that is too big to let ride in the cab, and you’d like to be able to put him in the bed of your pickup, but don’t want to risk having him jump out, then what you need to do is build yourself a dog box for your truck.
The way it will work is you will buy and use some lumber to make a box that will sit firmly in the bed of your truck that is big enough to hold your dog, but will also be small enough that your dog won’t be thrown around inside the box as you drive around and especially when you make turns.
You’ll also likely want to put something on the floor of your box so that your dog will have something to hold onto, instead of sliding around.
What you do is first measure the width of your truck, if you don’t know its exact dimensions. You’re going to want some boards that are long enough to fit from the top of one side of your bed to the top of the other side. You’ll also want some boards that fit inside the bed reaching from one side to the other, thus, your box won’t be rectangular, or even square as you need to build the box to follow the contours of your truck bed and sides.
The idea is to build a box in such a way that it will hold together whether it’s in the back of your truck or not so that you can take it out when you want to.
The next thing you need to decide is if you want your dog to be able to see out of the box or not. If so, you will build a frame and cover it with chicken wire, but if not, you just build it with boards all the way around.
Also, you don’t need to make a back for the box unless you want to, because you can build your box so that it will sit firmly against the cab, which means your dog wouldn’t be able to get out that way.
So, what you do is nail your boards together so that they form the box size you are after, and then nail eye screws on the top that can be used to secure the box in the truck where your truck posts will go. Then it’s just simple matter of using a wire to secure one to the other, which has the added advantage of making it easier to take the box out of the truck when you want, and also to tighten the wire to such a degree as to keep the box from being able to move around.
To finish, you can throw a piece of carpet on the bed of the truck before setting your box in and securing it in place.
As an added note, if you are worried that your driving will cause your dog to get knocked around in your box, you can always glue or staple some padding to the sides and bottom of the box to make things more comfortable for your pet.
