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Re: Wampus Cat
More Bed Work
I had been delayed for a little while in finishing the paint stripping because I couldn’t find more of the abrasive fiber discs that I was using for that. I recently found some more discs, and started up again on stripping paint from the inside of the side panels and the fender wells.
I also drilled the ¼” tread plate floor for some lifting eyes which can eventually be used for tie downs. I’ve welded nuts to the underside of the treadplate so that the eyes can be unscrewed and removed from the top.
While doing the paint stripping, I noticed that the metal panel below the tailgate was bent inwards about 3/8”. Not sure why I didn’t see that before, but I’m guessing that the damage was done when the tailgate was bent (see tailgate straightening in post #161 above). In any case, I rigged up a fixture with a few blocks of wood and a couple pieces of angle stacked on top of each other for stiffness. With this, I could use a large C-clamp to pull on this lower panel and its supports to straighten it. After working my way back and forth across the panel, pulling with the C-clamp, I was able to get the panel straight within about a 1/32” compared to a 4 ft straight edge.
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