Jan 2006

After taking November and December off, I started working on the truck again in January 2006. I decided to give the bedsides and underlying support beams to a local sand blaster to clean up. I had done some sandblasting on them, but had run out of time on the blaster rental before they were done.

Before sending them out I had to straighten some panels and pull a few of the bigger dents. I also had to remove the 1" or so lip of old diamond plate still welded to each side from the floor I had cut out back in August. This wasn't easy, since I didn't want to damage the bed sides themselves, but by taking several passes with a circular saw w/metal cutting blade I got it all off. I think it took two blades to do it though.
I also removed the old reflectors. The photo is from one of the bedsides that was partially sandblasted. It shows the original olive drab, and how close the Gillespie OD comes. I'm holding one of the inner fender wells I had already painted next to the original 1945 paint that was exposed when I removed the reflector. Not a bad match really.