A '54 named Busty

[Gregski]

and just like that we now had two 78" long bed side rails, we shall drill some holes in them for spot welding next

[Gregski]

picked up where I left off yesterday working on the bed side rails

drilled some offset spot weld holes and counter sunk them

had a really sharp drill bit so I was bumbed when I broke it, I think it was on the very last hole too

deburred them and cleaned up the areas for welding

[Gregski]

shot the backside with some expensive primer and put them in the Sun Oven for as long as it took me to do something else

[Gregski]

Christmas in April !

Highwood 2x6s x 8 Ft never needs no paintin' nor a stainin'

9 pieces $270

[Gregski]

made a jig with a stop bumper to make sure each cut was 77 1/4"

[Gregski]

so tried the first one and it fit like a glove, they sit about 1/4 higher than the stock ones I guess but that don't bother me non (looks higher in the pic for some reason)

Angle iron will have to be shortened 1/2"

[Gregski]

shortening and rounding the angle iron, any socket will do, and Bob's your uncle

[Gregski]

sorry had to do this, this part was sooooo much fun

[Gregski]

... wait for it ...

[Gregski]

wait a minute...

the bed is 50" wide

I bought nine 2x6s so ... 9 x 6 = 54 that wouldn't even fit

ok, but this is America in 2020 so a 2x6 is actually a 1 1/2 x 5 1/2 ok let's try this again.... 9 x 5.5 = 49.5"

well that sure don't look like only a 1/2" gap

one more time, these are only 5 1/4 go figure, that's why I waited until they arrived to figure out how I was going to run them

so 9 x 5.25 (carry the one... times the circumference of the earth, lol) = 47.25"

so we gots a 2 3/4" gap to fill

[Gregski]

couple ways to take that out, but we're gonna run it Farmer Style, aka with gaps, cause I sure aint gonna haul water

plus on a serious note, these are plastic so this will give the heat off the exhaust pipes someplace to go (though I am still planning to run my tailpipes over the axle and out the back)

I think these stir sticks are 1/8" thick but I aint doing the math

[Gregski]

according to my eyecrometer this left us with a 3/16s gap on each side, which the angle iron will easily cover

[Gregski]

pardon me while I admire my perfectly strait cuts (it's a rare occurrence)

[Gregski]

man this is turning out sooooo good!

[Gregski]

so back to those angle iron sides...

... and Welding Advice from A Guy Who Should Most Definitely Not Be Giving Welding Advice

I won't lie to you the first side went horribly, there were basically two issues, first because my wood is thicker my angle iron sits 1/4 or more higher so the side panels are not flat there they are embossed in certain places so you loose maybe 40% of your spot welds cause they won't touch the sheet metal, second I could not get my machine dialed in so the spot welds that I did weld were kinda holding but I didn't think that was going to be enough

so I decided to weld on top of the angle iron, and that was horrible too, the machine would either sound like bacon frying (good sound like when I was welding sheet metal) but it would just lay a fat bead on top of the angle iron, no penetration. I kept messing with and increasing the voltage gradually to the max and it would make no sound just do weird stuff, but not good

I was getting discouraged, but I told myself if you can't weld after this project (ie you lay down 47 yards of bead, ha ha) then maybe you should consider a team sport, lol

[8man]

Bed looks good. Good luck on welding through the angle.

[Gregski]

Originally Posted by 8man

Bed looks good. Good luck on welding through the angle.

Thanks mate, fingers crossed

[Gregski]

but I pressed on and went to the other side, here I did two things that made a world of difference:

1. I cleaned multiple spots to put my ground clamp on, maybe 3 or 4 spots on this angle iron, where I only had one on the other side, this allowed me to move the ground as close to where I was welding as possible

2. I twisted the other knob (despite of what the recommendation chart told me) so in other words I increased my wire speed, just by a notch as your spark box may differ, and oh lordy now we was cooking with propane, and it sounded like bacon frying on steroids

LESSON LEARNED:

Don't think of the knobs as wire speed and voltage, just think of them as Knob A and Knob B and twist them a bit at a time until you find the combination that works.

yes the close ups are the good ones, ha ha, hey I'm learning and I am honestly proud(ish) of those welds

[Gregski]

I'm not sure I am going to fill in all the gaps but I did the ones closest to the tailgate (one on each side) using scrap metal

and keep in mind all of this still needs to be ground down and sanded flat, I hope to put a nice rounded edge all around that angle iron

[Gregski]

I was hoping to finish the exhaust today but after a little touch up welding on the angle iron bed sides I was completely out of welding gas, so after hours of welding flush the spot welds and making the other beads look decent here's what I did instead

[Gregski]

with the bed sides masked off I shot some primer on the angle iron and on the bed sides below it

Fun Fact: Did you know that this RUST-OlEUM primer is the exact same formula as the automotive one you buy at AutoZone and other car parts places, yet costs half as much?

[Gregski]

so sprayed the bed side rails with some RUST-OLEUM Satin black today, honestly as you will see later when I paint other bits that there's nothing Satin about it, it comes out Semi Gloss, so rather disappointing, but on here I don't care

[Gregski]

then I made the other sides of the grille and headlight bits black, not happy at all with this so called "Satin" paint from RUST-OLEUM it is more like their Semi-Gloss than satin, that's for sure, luckily a lot of this stuff won't be seen so it's just there for protection and I have an idea for the headlight bezels and grill pieces

[LT7A]

Hey, isn't this paint for your other truck? That's what it says anyway.

[LT7A]

Originally Posted by LT7A

Hey, isn't this paint for your other truck? That's what it says anyway.

Although acquiring paint named for this truck might be kind of awkward. The shops that carry it are probably in another part of town and it may well have glitter in it.