I get all the wood we use from Home Depot, runs about fifty bucks. I dig through the pile and get fairly clear wood but really don't care about the grain pattern. There are three Home Depot's and three Loew's between the house and shop so it gives a good selection. I just use regular pine because these trucks are never going to haul anything and the grain is pretty. The boards are run on edge through the table saw with the blade against the fence and up 5/8". Then they are run through a second time with the blade 5/8 of an inch from the fence and up 1/8". That's it--ready for finishing. The red 48 has the aluminum strips with a "T" slot on the under side so no bolts show. The 65 shows the fuel filler on the bed side to fill the Blazer tank at the rear and the red 48 and orange 49 have one bed board that swings up to expose the fuel filler. The blue and white Cameo is a high point restoration so the bed mounting bolts run through the wood like the factory did but we seldom do.
Oops, the red 48 might have been a comlete kit from Mar-K. If any of you wood guru's correct me I won't be insulted.
Wood is wood! What I did notice is the awesome, Genuine GM pushbutton tailgate fastener! What a great concept!
Somewhere there is a link to a site that has the original number and sizes of boards for the different years -- can anyone tell me where to find it? Thanks, Glenn
Glenn, you don't need anything but your bed if someone hasn't drilled extra holes in the rear bed cross member. Measure BETWEEN the bolt holes (not center to center) and this gives each boards width. I give an extra 1/8 (1/16th off each board) because the bolt holes in the crossmember are for the 1/4 inch carriage bolts that go between the boards and don't give much leeway. The bed strips easily compensate for some variation.
Evan, Thank you, my bed was all torn apart and I never thought of that.I have a parts truck that still has a little bit of the wood--I can confirm measurements from that as well. Your help is always appreciated. Glenn
Bed Hints Hope you don't mind if a TF driver and regular lurker on this AD section of the forum chimes in. I'm still pondering what to do with my bed, but while searching around I found that Mar-K has loads of tips and useful information on their site, and you can buy everything you need from them too. Here's a link to their instalation tips page. http://www.mar-k.com/installation_hints.html Stan
