Thought I'd toss up some pics of recent activity in my driveway. Got the bug to paint the 3100 and when I took the bed off it seemed like a perfect time to replace the stock leaf rear suspension in favor of a 4-link to lower it and give a better (stiffer) ride. The guy that sold me the truck gave me most of the parts (brackets & links) from a universal 4link kit to get started. I fabbed the panhard bar and everything else from stuff at the local hardware superstore. The bed is made of POPLAR, cost about $60 and turned out NICE! Local lumber yard that sells hardwoods too let me choose 4 14' pieces then I ripped em and DADOed grooves (for the stainless strips) on a table saw. Clear Urethaned em and bolted em in. Poplar was less than half the price of OAK is still pretty hard and even has some 'flaming' like maple. The paint is a single stage with flattener. I sprayed it in a paint booth with a HVLP gravity feed gun. There's almost 3 gallons (with flattener, hardener, reducer) on there. I prepped the **** out of it too so you'd have to look a LONG time to find any scratches, waves, or bumps. I got more pics on my site: my rides
That looks good. What's under the wood? I have a bed with no floor, and I thought metal had to go back in there before the wood?
The bed wood rests on the front and rear lips of the bed and on two 'crossmembers' that run accross the bed. There are seven rows of bolts that run across the boards. Four rows of bolts go through the wood and the bed 'lips' or crossmembers, and the other rows hold the stainless strips to the wood. Basically, the wood IS exposed on the top and bottom which is why they don't last very long. The wood's 3/4" thick and, with the crossmembers, makes a solid bed. The 48 originally had 9 boards of varying widths with the widest board in the middle. I changed it to 8 boards, all 6" wide and drilled new holes in the crossmembers cuz I didn't want to cut all those different widths! Damn, I could go on.....
Thanks. I've got a 50 Ford, and I think from you're description it works/would work the same. I just have the box with the four sides - I always ***umed there was metal under the wood.
The Poplar looks great.... How about a better pic of that Panhard bar, I need to do one for the wagon.. not sure where to start so any help would be great...
I don't have any better pics of the panhard bar installed, but heres the pieces: The brackets are made from pieces of angle iron (3" I think) seated inside one another and welded up (Drill holes first). Grind the top off the taller side. The bar itself is iron pipe and the bushing material is PVC pipe from the plumbing dept. Ya gotta dig around and find just the right sizes so everything fits together hand in glove. The PVC coupling had the threads cutoff and then cut directly in half leaving some ridge and stuffed in the iron pipe so the ridge is all you see on either side of the pipe. Weld the brackets to the rearend and a crossmember or part of the frame and stuff Grade 8 bolts through. I made my panhard adjustable by welding a nut and bolt into the pipe so it can screw in/out to lengthen/shorten.
I would try to find some real bushing to replace that PVC. Pvc gets brittle and won't last long, if at all. Just a heads up.
Hey man your truck looks really good..!!! I like the bed too...good job..!! I have a '52 Chevy p/u and I've been contemplating putting a metal floor in the bed of it... I think it would be difficult to piece together a decent one from a later style pick up, because of the beating a truck gets in general, and also the wheel wells too... Not to hijack this post, but, I SWEAR I saw a Chevy truck website a few years ago that sold a 'metal floor kit' for these truck beds, but like an idiot, I didn't save the link... Does anybody know of a supplier that sells such a thing..???
SNACKY - Before I committed to the Poplar I considered doing a diamond plate aluminum bed. It would have cost about $250 for the material. I was gonna use the existing wood bed crossmembers and drill holes and bolt the piece in. Tough part about those beds is that they're a little over 4 feet wide !! which means you can't build a bed with a typical 4x8 sheet. About the PVC - The fun part about working on cars for me is figuring **** out and creating new stuff. The barends of the 'professional' 4link kit I was working with had bushings that looked EXACTLY like PVC and got me thinking. Bushings have evolved from RUBBER to POLYURETHANE - a much harder plastic. PVC is PolyVinyl, doesn't degrade in UV, withstands high temperature and pressure fluctuations, is CHEAP and AVAILABLE. I really wanted to get the panhard bar on and get on with other projects. If the PVC cracks and fails it's not dangerous. I'll just pop out the bolt and try something else. We'll see!!
Summ*****, a Rumbler actually doing something.....wadda****? Whoops shouldn't have said that. Luv, Nads.
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