Wonder what the purpose was for these? Don't look like they would be strong enough to keep the truck from moving on a train or some other source of transportation. I thought they might have been used in manufacturing to hold the frame while it went down the assembly line. ???

 

I never got to see the factories where these things were made, but at the time modern car factories were using automatic guided (AKA "robotic") vehicle systems to move in-process stock. The vehicles in production usually just sat on them, perhaps with some safety restraints but primarily held in place only by the thumb of Sir Isaac Newton. Among other things, it made exception handling easy -- instead of uncoupling the vehicle from a track in the floor and manually moving it, you just told the AGV to go where you needed for the vehicle to be.

I was getting paid to play with those kinds of things back in the mid-1990's. I'd still be doing it if the company I worked for hadn't got bankrupted by a guy who didn't die soon enough.

 

That's the best kind of job to have.

 

I'd go so far as to say that it's the only kind of job to have, but I'm immature and irresponsible. Working for wages quit being fun for the last time about 20 years ago so I don't engage in that foolishness any more.

 

I actually saw a set of these on a Durango the other day. Guessed the forgot to remove them on it too.