'76 Battery Tray

[Rust-O-Matic]

The battery tray in my '76 GMC rusted in two, and I'd like to replace it. Stupid question, but how is it put together?

The bottom tray portion and vertical support portion are sold as 2 separate pieces, so they must come apart. But I don't see any bolts holding the 2 pieces together. Am I missing something?

To clarify, this is the typical tray on the passenger side between the inner fender and core support.

[oltronj]

The only thing I can think of is that if it is in 2 pieces it can be mounted on either side of the engine bay by swapping the vertical side from one side to the other for if you want to move your battery or have dual batteries.

[Rust-O-Matic]

Yeah, I think you are correct, but my question is how do the two pieces come apart where they are circled in black? Are they welded or are there fasteners I'm overlooking?

[ElGracho]

Originals are spot welded together. Aftermarket bolt together or you could weld. Buy both aftermarket pieces.

[Rust-O-Matic]

Ok, cool. It's so rusty I couldn't feel any spot welds, but I thought that might be the case. I'll get both replacement pieces. Thanks!

[RADustin]

Originally Posted by oltronj

The only thing I can think of is that if it is in 2 pieces it can be mounted on either side of the engine bay by swapping the vertical side from one side to the other for if you want to move your battery or have dual batteries.

each side uses the same tray with a side specific vertical.

[tucsonjwt]

I don't know about your 76 but my 83 was all one piece when I bought the aftermarket one from LMC. As I recall, you can get aftermarket trays on Ebay or Amazon for not much money now, and some of them are epoxy coated or have some sort of rubberized finish. Given the rust you have, I would use a battery mat and coat the entire tray and support with some sort of bed liner
goop. I just used Harbor Freight Iron Armor on the inside of my cab and it looks like it will work out OK.

[Dead Parrot]

I pulled a set during a trip to Pull-a-Part. The two pieces are held together by one bolt about where bright rust spot is along the join line in the original pic. The spot even with the drain hole. Don't remember what year truck but it was mostly rust free so seemed worth grabbing.

[Rust-O-Matic]

Here's a couple of notes for the next guy that has the same questions I did:

1973-80 uses the same tray, 81-up is different.

Rockauto stocks both pieces for way cheaper than LMC, Classicparts, Brothers, etc.

The Goodmark branded replacements I bought are basically identical to the originals, though the Taiwan-made fit isn't perfect, and they have no provisions to bolt the two pieces together. Since the coolant overflow bolts to the back side of the vertical bracket, there's no real great place to through-bolt it anyway.

I am going to pull the bottom portion back out tonight, drill a couple holes through the side of it, and plug weld it to the vertical bracket, to mimic the spot welds of the original.

Also, the grill has to be removed to get to one of the bolts. Keep track of the little plastic retainer nuts that the screws go into. It's very easy to lose one of em...