2021 Ram 1500 Complaint
Unknown Or Other
Filed April 15, 2023 · Incident date December 22, 2022
- Vehicle
- 2021 Ram 1500
- Component(s)
- Unknown Or Other
- Complaint filed
- April 15, 2023
- Date of incident
- December 22, 2022
- Reported VIN
- 1C6SRFPT8MN
Owner's description
The soft trifold tonneau cover supplied by Ram is under designed and a safety hazard. My tonneau cover blew off my truck while drive down I75 it was installed properly and was in excellent condition. In the darkness of early morning and a gusting day while passing under an overpass at 75 miles per hour the legal northern Michigan speed limit on December 22nd 2022 a cold wind day. This cover is held in place with 4 small plastic clips. the clips failed on the uplift of a gust of wind. The wind was likely just under 60 mile per hour gusts as the Mackinaw bridge was slow speed but not yet closed. I was about 4 mile from the Bridge. The hold down clip have a cross sectional area of a mere 0.28 SqIn at failure point. the 2 drivers side failed as the cover lifted. The cover has a 5052 SqIn surface area to be held down by the 7800 lbs. load cap of 2 clips. A mere 1.55 psi of uplift caused by a 50+ mph wind gust which can generate more than 100psi certainly tossed my cover into the bush. This is a travesty to have these trifold covers on the road supplied by a reputable company who wish to ignore the situation. I have made numerous attempts to have RAM address this but to no avail. I would hope the NTSB will force a recall all these covers. the Mackinaw bridge authority makes you remove them to cross the bridge in extreme winds.
Check a specific vehicle
Enter your VIN to see all NHTSA complaints, recalls, and safety ratings for that exact vehicle.
Related
Data sourced from the NHTSA Complaints database. Complaints are submitted by vehicle owners and have not been independently verified.