The Stovebolt Site Forums The Parking Lot Panels 'N Burbs 57 Panel Truck Floor

I pulled a floor out of my second truck to use as a template, it is one sloid sheet of 3/4 plywood. Has anyone used solid lumber in a panel truck before? i'm thinking hickory or goin even cheaper with some treated lumber. I have priced up plywood and all i can het is cabinet grade at 335.00 per sheet, it would take two of them since i have a 1 ton model, any suggestions or thoughts?

I'd stick with ply as the factory designed it, there's a reason .... look for marine ply, can get it in different sizes than the standard construction plys

Bill

Marine grade comes in huge sheets.

5/8 ply comes in 4x9 sheets for exterior siding.Without the grooves. Just sand the resawn side smooth. Inside a panel,its never exposed to any weather,so, should last a lifetime.

I would be curious to know how you got the old floor out in one piece.

Weeds

Weeds - on the TF series, the body sits on the ply, lifting the body off the frame allows the ply to be unbolted and dropped down, you may have a different situation with the AD panel

Bill

Doing this with solid lumber would be very nice looking but you would never be able to keep it from warping in 3/4". Your best bet is ply. I have a 56 1 ton and have thought of the possible ways to do it. You should look at Weed's post on how he did it. The way he did it looks great and you wouldn't have to wrestle one huge sheet. Being that you already have a template piece though, marine grade is the only way to go. I would also suggest some kind of undercoating on the bottom and edges to keep it from rotting, especially the edges! You can get some beautiful marine grade maple. You could stain it in a walnut color. Both have a very tight grain and it would look close. Keep us posted and post some pics. I would love to see it. I have one question, how did you jack up the whole body to get that out?

one way that was to move that body off a rotten frame and onto the good frame in the foreground - other one I've done was with a friends walking crane hoist to put it on a dolly to work on, picked up like at the factory by the 3 door openings - meanwhile made a new floor panel to put it back on

Bill

I replaced the plywood in my 65 suburban. It was 3/4", 2 pieces held in place with caged nuts along the parimeter and it had those countersunk washers with the off center square hole for use with carrige bolts. It was a lap joint down the middle.
I folded the aft edge of the back floor forward to get the lip off the wood and pulled each piece inboard and they came out fine. I used them as templates and used exterior grade plywood that I treated with water proofing, no problems!

You don't want treated lumber in your truck.

why don't you want treated lumber in your truck?