Bed Wood

[LinkbeltOE]

Hey guys,
I am in the middle of restoring my long bed stepside wood and noticed the width of my bed wood is not the same, I want to make all the boards the same width and add another strip so all boards are about 5" wide. What I was wondering is has anyone done this and if so how does it look? Any help would be appreciated. The 2 end boards are about 2" wide then 4 boards are just under 8" and 2 boards are about 6". I have some really really nice Brazillian Walnut 1" X 6" and want to use it, what do ya think?

[TheDark1]

I haven't ever done it, but I don't see why it can't be done. You'll have to redrill all the holes I'm sure. You might want to use some pine or plywood as a template. It's relatively cheap and you'd get an idea of how the pieces would fit. Sounds like a nice project, though.

[jason65]

www.Mar-k.com has some good instructions on it.

[doubledog]

i just finished mine a couple of days ago,but i went with the kit from classic parts,for the money around 500$ and all the stainless you cant beat it i dont think,just my two cents.here is a couple of pics,i just posted in another thread. this is yellow pine it runs a little cheaper than the oak does .

[jason65]

Doubledog, did you have to drill the outside edges where the wood meets the edges of the bed or did it come all predrilled?

[doubledog]

the holes on the out side edge have to be drilled by yourself but the rest were predrilled but they charge you a extra 30$ for drilling but it is worth the money as you can see every thing fits real nice.i put some stainless strips over the top of the existing rails attached to the bedsides a few of the holes were rusted a little bit.

[502tripower]

Originally Posted by LinkbeltOE

Hey guys,
I am in the middle of restoring my long bed stepside wood and noticed the width of my bed wood is not the same, I want to make all the boards the same width and add another strip so all boards are about 5" wide. What I was wondering is has anyone done this and if so how does it look? Any help would be appreciated. The 2 end boards are about 2" wide then 4 boards are just under 8" and 2 boards are about 6". I have some really really nice Brazillian Walnut 1" X 6" and want to use it, what do ya think?

I have made several bed wood kits both stock and custom. If your material is not wide enough you can do a tung and grove joint and glue two pices together to get the desired dimension or do a bisquet joint. I prefer the tung and grove. Once the glue is set then resurface your material to 3/4". Here is a link to the dimentions you need. Good Luck
http://www.gmcpauls.com/47-72_BedWood_Info.htm

[apachedaddy]

I think what he was asking was missed. Yes you can do it with the equal width boards. You will just have to drill some new holes in your cross sills and add another strip. That will get the look your asking about. I did it that way with some wood i had floating around to get a floor in it. But i did go with a kit from MAR-K when i re-did the bed because it needed all new cross sill's and didn't want to drill more holes in the new ones.

[502tripower]

Originally Posted by apachedaddy

I think what he was asking was missed. Yes you can do it with the equal width boards. You will just have to drill some new holes in your cross sills and add another strip. That will get the look your asking about. I did it that way with some wood i had floating around to get a floor in it. But i did go with a kit from MAR-K when i re-did the bed because it needed all new cross sill's and didn't want to drill more holes in the new ones.

I think we got what he was asking but the problem with making the boards all the same width is he will be adding bed strips and I don't know if you can just buy the bed strips one by one? I think they are sold as a kit? I think the reason he was asking if he could make all the boards the same width is his material was not wide enough?

[LinkbeltOE]

apachedaddy, & 502tripower you are both right. I know I have to drill new holes and buy another strip and yes they sell the strips separately and in a kit, what I was asking is, 1.If anyone had done it? And B. if anyone had pics and knew if there poses a problem? Also what ya'll thought of the hard, hard wood I chose for the bed. If I knew how to send a pic in here I'd post it. It is sweet.

[LinkbeltOE]

502tripower,
That would be a great website if I were to go with original wood widths,Thank you for it tho.

[LinkbeltOE]

Anyone else?

[LinkbeltOE]

Well I got the wood milled down to ORIGINAL spec,I didn't go with all the boards being uniform due to just didn't want to drill all those holes. If I knew how to put pics up here I would and if anyone could help me out that would be great.

[joe231]

http://67-72chevytrucks.com/vboard/s...d.php?t=295313

http://67-72chevytrucks.com/vboard/s...d.php?t=209103

http://67-72chevytrucks.com/vboard/s...d.php?t=201224

[LinkbeltOE]

How do I resize them?

[LILRED66]

On your computer, go to Windows Explorer and find where you keep your pictures stored on your computer. Double click on the photo you want to post. On the bottom right side of the screen showing the photo, there is an icon for resizing a photo and the prompt will ask if you want to close this application and open the photo for resizing. It will then pull up the photo and you can drag the borders in a bit to decrease the width or height. After doing so, you can save the photo under "save as" and name it whatever you want so you can find it later. After you have done this you go to the forums and hit the Go Advanced icon. The screen will refresh and there will be a paperclip in the icon choices. Click on the paper clip icon and a browse window will appear. Click the top browse icon and it will direct you to the various locations of your photo locations. Find the photo you resized and double-click on it and the file name of the photo will appear on the title line next to the browse icon. Click on upload photo and if all was done properly, the photo will now be on the thread you are creating. If it doesn't work, call me and I will talk you through the process. Once you do it, you will get the hang of it and have a lot more enjoyment with the site. Good luck and let me know if I can help.

[LinkbeltOE]

http://yfrog.com/b7p1040061j I went with stock.

[LILRED66]

The width of the boards in the bed, stepside or fleetside, is only limited by your imagination. Make sure when laying out the widths, the wear strips do not land on the locations of the bed-to-frame bolt locations. These locations correspond with the factory landing locations of the cross sills and the factory stand-offs on the frame to accept the cross sills. The reason the boards are various widths is to avoid this problem.

The overall integrity of the bed/wood/cross sill/wear strip assembly is maximized by the number of fasteners through the wear strips and the perimeter flange at the bed sides & wheel tubs, plus the fact that they are backed-up underneath with the perpendicular cross sills and this sub-assembly securely attaches in serveral locations to the stand-ups on the frame. Eliminating the wear strips reduces the number of fasteners holding the entire assembly together, but I don't think it would compromise the assembly structurally.

I know you decided to move forward with the factory assembly method, so this information may not be much help, but I wanted to share anyway. Good luck and hopefully you can post some pictures of the process.

[LinkbeltOE]

Did my link to a pic work?

[msgross]

I've got NOS bed wood for sale in the 67-72 parts board..

I might go with walnut..

[joe231]

this one?


yeah it worked

[LinkbeltOE]

OH geez thats huge.........yeah you need to resize that.

[joe231]

yeah sorry....I just linked it to your pic...didn't realize it was so big

[Mad Max]

I think you should just sell the box to me and go with a fleetside instead !
(yeah I know....fat chance)

[Tomb23]

Has anyone installed Bedwood With out drilling though the 2 boards with the offset washers? Is there an alternate way ?