Bed Wood or How to piss away 6 hours of your life

[ChevyNewb]

So we sanded and stained and put 4 full coats of clear on our bed wood. Basically lovingly caressed every square inch of the boards...they look great!
Struggled for 6 hours putting the boards down with the strips (crawling under the truck, mistake #1)
When we mocked everything up, it all fit perfectly. When we started putting it down (from middle out, like we read) our problem started. Off by an 1/8th here and there. We got frustrated and due to time constraints just bolted everything down.
Came out this morning only to realize our bed wood supplier gave us what we asked for in steel strips. NO COATING at all (mistake #2) So now we will have to remove the strips and sand them, then clear or paint, depending on how bad the surface rust is.
So please learn from our mistakes, we intend to take the bed OFF the truck to install, possibly going so far as to stand it upright. Then sand and lovingly caress the steel strips and then install from one side to the other. I am sure without the agony of lying under the bed on the concrete, we might even enjoy our adventure more...
I will post pics later...