The Stovebolt Site Forums The Shop Area Paint and Body Shop Tailgate 1947 3104

If it was mine, the first thing I would do is clamp the tailgate bow side down and the bottom facing you, to a strong steel table, two timbers or steel beams, with the bottom facing you, so you can remove the bend. Position it with a 1x4 plank in the middle (so you can over bend the tailgate) then add clamps to both sides. I would protect the tailgate with some wood under the clamps. Slowly clamp a little on each side while hammering the bowed out sections on the top and bottom (bottom of the tailgate) relieving the stress. Clamp a little more and continue to hammer relieving the stress. Continue this process and clamp until you’re bowed in the other direction. You’ll need your over bend the tailgate, under the clamping force because once you remove the clamp it will relax some, hopefully straight. If not bend some more.

This process should remove the big bows and leave just a little dimple at the very top on the rounded corner. I would then use a stud welder and slide hammer to remove that dimple.

If you don’t have such a tool, I would drill a hole on the backside and use a drift pin to punch that dimple out. That would leave a small hole on the inside of the tailgate to weld.

You could also drill a hole in the deepest part of the dimple and use a slide hammer with a screw attachment to help remove the remaining dent. I personally don’t like this method as it tends to raise the section around the screw more then the dent.

I would also remove the bend at the top (same clamping technique), as you’re going this process, as that will also reduce the overall stress in the tailgate.

On the top roll, I had a pretty good dent that I removed by cutting on both sides, drilled out the spot weld, then pealed back the metal to access it from the back side. Once the dent was removed, I started to bend it back slowly, tacking the seams along the way as they aligned to one another.

You could probably remove most of those dents without repainting, then remove the rest when/if you decide to repaint the entire truck.