Custom rear steel bumper with hitch and Tennessee plate

For the past ~5 years, I haven't been able to open my tailgate. I knew what caused it - these 2 & another that was even harder:

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I figured I had bent the frame up behind the rear axle, and I thought I could see a small wrinkle in the top flange of each rail where the body mount hole is. But I didn't understand how it could happen with polyurethane body mounts, since they don't compress like the OE vulcanized rubber, and mine didn't look distorted at all. It took a trip to a frame shop to figure out that it was the BODY; not the frame.

Owner caption June 2009 · Photo 2629 of 5000