The Stovebolt Site Forums The Shop Area Making a Stovebolt Bed 1948 GMC 1ton Box Re-build

Hello,

I looked over a bunch of posts on the re-building of my 1948 GMC 1ton box. Every thread had pieces that fit into my puzzle, but I didn't want to hijack any thread, so here I start my own (again).

My box is now apart. The sides are good, except for about 4" of the left side & right side angle piece, right at the end where it meets the rear cross sill. We can manufacture a filler for this 4": and spotweld it on. The rest is all good, needs a little massaging, but doable.

Now the wood. I found 9 board - long-bed kits from USD700 to USD4,500 (the high price comes with an installer?) and I am probably not spending all my retirement money on this truck, so go with a lower priced kit.

I also don't like the boards finished to the level where one sees every scratch and was thinking about the old style linseed oil finish. Would it make sense to get the boards and soak them over weeks or months in linseed oil?

Time is not of the essence, because the cleaning, sandblasting, powder coating for frame and body painting will take some month.

Is the assumption correct that the best way to assemble all is starting with the cross members, sides-walls and rear sill-plate then the boards, starting from each side and the head-wall last?

Attached some pictures again.

Your bedsides look better than mine did. You can get new angle strips and attach them (spot welding as you mentioned would be best.) Any pieces of the bedsides themselves would best be butt welded in place and metal finished to blend in with the existing metal.

The original board finish was linseed oil with lampblack in it, giving the wood an opaque black finish. What I used on my wood was an oil based black stain that the supplier claimed was good for decks in Fairbanks, Alaska, so should be OK for you in Alberta. It was a very thin material that soaked into the wood, but I did have some issue getting it to dry. I applied multiple thin coats using a spray gun. This post shows what I used.

Here are a couple pics that'll give you some encouragement (or at least show you what's possible.)

Thanks Kevin,

As I mentioned, I tend to only cut the bad 4" off the end and have my genius welder son put a new made piece on. I am not really in favor to cut all spot-welds off and attache new angles.

if someone had 2x4 or 5" of some used angle he cut off, I could have that put on instead of forming some, but it should be do difficult for my fixer.

My son is gone until Wednesday and I will have him check this all over and advise me. He has to do the fixings anyway, I let work and have tea or coffee breaks.

What wood did you use, I probably could search your post, but I am getting lazy.

This will become my work truck and probably will see some stuff stuffed in to the box.

I used pine wood on my bed.

If your angle strips don't have rust-thru spots under them you might be able to just repair that end. But be aware that getting the rust out from between the bed sides and angle strips is going to be difficult or impossible. If you don't get the rust out, it'll expand under your new paint.

With the profile the angle strips it might be simpler to get a short section of new angle strip, although I have no doubt your son could form a piece to match. It just depends on how much work he wants to do. Cutting the entire angle strip off and replacing it with new would allow you to get the rust off the bedsides where the angle strip mounts.

You are absolutely right, Kevin and we will look at this very careful in the next days.

I will attache a picture looking at the mating of the angle strip with he wall and it is interesting that we have no 'swelling' between both, angle strip & wall. This is incredible for a 77 year old truck that has spent most of his life outside. The reason is probably the lack of moisture in our country and the only 250 mm (10") of precipitation we get in a year.

Taking all the spot-welds off is very time consuming and attaching it with screws changes the looks, too.

But, we will need to make a decision soon, before the thick walled pieces go to the sandblaster. Cab, fenders, etc. I will probably chemically paint strip and hand-sand.

Cutting spot welds isn't that much work with the proper spot weld tool. And you can plug weld the new angle piece to the bedside from the outside and finish the welds to be invisible. Again, that's what I'd recommend.

If you decide not to remove the angle strips and replace with new, have your sandblaster concentrate on the gap between bedside and strip both top and bottom. There IS rust under there, and you'll need to get as much as possible out. You might consider using some rust encapsulator produce worked into the gap.