Happy Birthday Boop!!! Wish her a happy birthday from me, too!!! I love the look of the ride. Man, I don't know what the complaint about the paint is, but it sure looks good on my 'puter. Maybe a little buff out will take care of the runs in the clear coat you are talking about. I see trucks like that and start thinking that I would just LOVE to put a high dollar paint job on the work truck I'm building with the kids. Ahh, but then it wouldn't be a work truck. I'll let the kids do the truck over again in a few years and make it real cherry. That's the plan. Teach them how now and let them do it by themselves later. Anyway, the truck looks GREAT. You must be very proud of your little girl and all her accomplishments which naturally reflect on your accomplishment as a good role model. Congratulations to you, my friend. I wonder if my truck would be ready to drive by the time a Dayton get together is planned sure would like to be ther for it and to help with the completion of the truck for the Boopster, but am too far away. Good luck. Andy
Hey Boop's Dad, I meant to tell ya to give the Boop a hug for me on her birhtday. I am sure she is tickled to have the truck this far along. Is this the 16th or 17th? Man, if only I could feel again like I did on my 16th. I took it for granted then cause I didn't have the way I feel now to compare to. Question about the bed. It looks like you haven't put in the bolts with the off center washers yet. Wha tis your plan? I am one step behind you and I am wondering about the cross members. My bed has 4 crossmembers plus the one at the back where the tailgate is. I wasn't planning on putting all five bolts all the way throught the bed wood. I figured I could put them through on the front crossmember, the center crossmember and the back one at the tailgate (even though it interferes with the bolt that holds the bumper brackets on. So, if I do that, do I just go ahead and bolt down the other crossmembers and waller out (woodworkers term) the bottom of the plank so that the wood fits flush, or do I just not put a bolt through that crossmember? Thanks, Gater
Bed Bolts I am actually in a quandry about the bolts myself. My concern is getting the running boards, front fenders, rear fenders and running board to bed skirts all to fit correctly without any excess space between them. I was waiting on the bed bolts until I get the front fenders and running boards in place so I can pull it all together. I don't know if this is the way to do it or not, it's trial and error at this point, but I don't want any gaps or mis-aligined body parts. If anyone has input on this I would sure appreciate it. The bed is sitting on the blocks and rubber pads hopefully in the correct spot. Since I cut, plained, cut edges and clear coated it myself, the holes were not pre-drilled and I sure don't want to drill the holes in the wronge place and have an un-needed DRAIN hole Any help gladly accepted TB'sD BTW - no one input on the Boops License plate
My plan is to drill a pilot hole with a small drill bit from the bottom up through the holes where I want to bolt down the bed. Then I will center the hole in the offset washer on tha thole from the top side. I will mark the edges on the bedwood with a pencil, remove the washer and determine the middle of the washer and make a small pilot hole there. Then I will put masking tape on the wood to protect it and guard against splintering. Then I plan to use the proper size forstner bit to countersink the washer to the flush depth. Remove the tape, place the washer and put in the bolt. Since I do not yet have my bed assembled, I may bolt down the boards tha tthe bolt go through, mark the hole, remove the boards and use my drill press to help ensure the proper countersink depth. So, my only question is how many bolts will I put all the way through and what will I do with the bed bolts that don't go all the way through? Good luck with yours. Let's keep the lines of communication open as we proceed. Gater
Number of holes Do you have a long or short bed? Mine is a short bed with only 6 bolts and my plan is the same as yours. But I am holding up on drilling those holes. Everything looks good to this point, just don't want to make a mistake. At this point it doesn't look like anything is in the way of any of my bolts. The Bed was acctually easy to assymble, but I did line everything up before I drilled any strip holes. I had to wallow out the hole between each board as to give room for future expansion but all holes did line up with the cross members fine. Keep me posted also. THanks, TB'sD
It's ALLLL good! What a truck, TB'sD! (plate and all) Since I'm not playing with boards like you two are, the only thing I might suggest is bolt the bed down as it is with as few bolts as you can. And by bolting down, I don't mean tightly AT all. In your case, TB'sD, I would imagine that after you have the bed semi secured, the next step would be attaching the running boards. If there were gaps, you could adjust the whole bed a tad-bit to remove the gaps. Once that's done then by all means go from down under with the small pilot bit! Absolutely NO GUESSWORK this way! Do the offsets need to be countersunk? At any rate- good luck you two! 2 years from now I'll get to see what this is like first hand- Good Lord willin'.
counter sunk Yes, the off set washers do need to be counter sunk. This is what keeps the bolts from turning when they are tightened and being counter sunk mkes them flush with the wood in the bed. I guess I could go ahead and dril holes and put in the bolts, there should be enough play to adjust the bed a little to close up any gaps. At least I hope there is I sure don't want to loose the bed when I start moving the truck to assymble the front end... that would be WAY un cool. I broke my first piece today, I took off the chrome cover that holds on the glass lense in the tail light to install the gasket which was in the box instead of on the light and droped it from about two inches, it hit a bed strip and shattered I know now why the gasket was not installed, it is a very, very tight fit and all said and done does not fit very well. I guess they don't use this kind of light in Taiwan. I will have to modify the light when I get the new lense, if not it may fall off going down the road. It's sure shiney, but not a very well made after market part. They just don't make em like they used too. If I had an original I would probably have it chromed and use it, but I don't. The last clutz that had the truck took all that off and cut holes in the back splash and installed, well half installed some sorry looking things from some place like Auto Zone. I had to weld all that up, bondo over and fix it back so the hack job didn't show. All in all the bed looks fair, It want win no show, but not too bad for a preacher I guess. Thanks for the help. Any body else with suggestions, chime in. All help appreciated. TB'sD
TBsD, My bed is 9 feet long. We bolted the bed down with no wood, secured fenders, running boards and theat splash pan between running board and bed then I will start on the bed wood. I think I will go with 6 bolts too unless I hear different from John Millman who has the 3800 pickup over on StoveBolt. I may have to use a sharpie to mark the holes from underneath instead of drilling since I would have to have a drill bit about a foot long to reach through the frame. Since my wood is still loose I can do that. Otherwise, I'll be looking for a long pilot bit. Gater
Boop Boop A Doop ! License plate is choice , hard to imagine you were able to score it . Tailgate hooks should always be hooked from underneath so when they bounce , they cannot possibly unhook and allow the tailgate to fall...... Farm way is to cut up an old bicycle tube and use that for a chain cover , don;t forget to cut a hole with the dydkes at the lowest place to let the rain water drain out . I take it you're cutting all your own bed wood sans plans ? . If you use the stock height bed blocks the splash pans will fit fine if a bit closely . you'll see . Early morning , *friday* and I got about 7 Hr. sleep last night , not uninteruppted but hey that's all godd . coffee soon .
I know the TF beds are different, but they still use the thru bolts with the offset washers. When I redid my '57 bed I didn't use the thru bolts at all. I bolted the cross braces to the to the frame and then bolted the skid strips to the cross braces. No big ugly bolts/washers showing on the top. Been driving it like that for 8 years now. Hasn't fallen off yet, but then again I haven't rolled the truck or filled the bed with gravel either. I have had 700+ pounds loaded in it more than once on 200+ mile highway trips.
The cable TV guys use really long drill bits. I found a 3/8" bit 18" long at Home Depot. Gotta go. 2" new powder awaits on the mountain. Today is the last day to ski on this trip.
TB'sD, You know, Bill Hanlon has a decent alternative here. I have thunk about it and I really don't see anything wrong with bolting the bed down by the bed rails then laying the bed wood over the rails without bringing the bolts through the wood. You would have to take a wood chisel or something and waller out for the carriage bolt heads so that the wood would lay down perfectly flat but that is all I can think of that you would have to do. The only downside I can think of is that you would probably have to cut the bolts off if you ever wanted to take the bed off someday cause you wouldn't have the offset washers to keep the bolt from turning. Unless, of course, you removed the bed wood before taking the bed off. I am going to ponder abit more on it. What do ya'll think? Gater
No Bolts? Acctually, that idea is a great one. I'm gona climb under the old hoopie and see if I cant figure out a way to do something simular. I think it can be done without much problem. Since I have already mounted all the lumber and have the bed finished except the 6 bolts and I don't want to disasymble it i'll have to drill the holes or find another way to hold it on. But I do like the idea... I'll keep ya posted on what I find. TB'sD
I got a 10mm drill bit 1500mm long! yup 1 and a half meters long! only needed it twice and you need two people to use it if you are on step ladders, cos you get half way through the wall and you need to pass the drill to someone else on ladders closer to the wall so you dont fall off yours lol ________ Mercedes-Benz W221 History
Boops Dad, Okay, after building some goat fence today and nearly getting blown off the hill from March winds I decided to take the plunge (get plunge, as in plunge cut) and work on the bed. I earlier said that I would use a sharpie to mark the underside of the boards but, due to tight quarters, I had to use a short pencil. Anyway, after marking all the holes I used a 1 inch forstner bit and plunged it 3/16 of an inch using my depth gauge that I tried numerous times on a scrap piece of wood before using it on the finished stock. Now the carriage bolt head is flush with the original surface of the wood and will not hump up the bed. Gater Here are some photos.
Loooooong Drill Bit Wow ! where didja find that ? I need a long bit but bigger as I need it to kill a pesky tree with.... -Nate
Meter? What I want to know is..... HOW LONG IS A METER?... Is that 14.1458395 inches Remember, I went to school a long time ago, we couldn't even spell mmmmmeeeeeettttttteeeeeeerrrrrrrr back then. Much less know what kind of critter it was Just funnin, I do know a meter is some sort of measurment, but I never learned how to make em work. Don't know if they are manuel or electric TB'sD
No , No ~ A Meter is the thing hanging on the side of the barn that spins and measures how much 'Lectricity your new Plasma TeeVee used last month... Jeeze , I gotta teach youse guys everything !
