Replacing Diamond Plate Steel Bed With Original Wood

[junk4cash]

Previous owner put this in who knows how long ago. I'm over the steel plate bed and would like to go back with to the original wood style bed. Has anyone out there made this swap? I see a lot of write ups about installing new wood but haven't found any on taking out welded in plate and swapping over to wood. Thanks for any and all info!

[LVPhotos]

Grind, grind , grind, beer, repeat.
Bed comes apart same as with wood. You just have to figure out how it was done. Probably just set bed on plate. Most likely two or more plates.

[earl84]

It's kind of hard to tell, but it looks like that diamond plate is just set in there, I can't make out any welds. Are the crossmembers still under there? If it's not welded, and you still have all the crossmembers, you'll just have to get the strips and either buy or mill the wood. Having milled my own, I highly recommend buying it, haha.

[jayoldschool]

Yep, that metal is under the tubs, and the corners, just like the wood. Take out the tubs, cut/pull the metal floor, have a look at your cross members, and get working on wood. Have you looked at it from underneath? Wood and strips might still be there...

[junk4cash]

Thanks for all the advice. I looked underneath and there are a few small strips of wood but nothing larger than a postcard. The cross braces are all being used to hold the plate steel in place. One cross brace is loose and just laying there. Remove the bed?

[jayoldschool]

No, just pull the tubs and the metal floor. You'll then have this to deal with:



Put the work in... and in no time it will look like this:



I did it all myself, and you can too!

[Captainfab]

A 4.5 or 5" grinder with some cutoff wheels and cut all the welds you can find.

[SayBye]

cutting wheel and grinder and youll be wooding it in no time.

im putting a wooden floor in the bed of my 64 as we speak.