Introduction and bedside repair question

[Tumbleweed1C4]

First of all, let me say I have already learned a lot from this forum and spent many hours simply enjoying myself like a kid in a candy store looking at build threads, all as a lurker for several years until I finally just joined. I have an ongoing lifetime love affair with these trucks, and previously owned a 1967 Grapefruit 2wd LWB, and a 1972 K5 Blazer which I turned Hugger. Both are sadly gone, they didn't survive a military career, but I retired, started a new career and replaced them with a Omaha Orange 72 GMC SWB 4X4, which is currently in pieces and my project, and another Hugger (I like 'em Orange!) 1972 Blazer that is a nice driver that I hope to restore once the GMC is running. Big Dreams.






I have started working on it again, and the bedsides have some damage on the lowers due to somebody jumping the truck as it was a mud bogger, sigh. I have straightened them out and sanded the area down, and removed a bunch of bondo somebody put in instead of hammer and dolly work. I ordered patch panels, but I started hammer and dollying it to straighten as much as I could to see if I could save it, because a lot of the metal is in good shape other than the dents. I am a total newbie to the hammer and dolly, so I don't know how far I should go with it before doing more damage than good.



It is not smooth, I took out the big dents, but should I keep working on it, or get it close and use filler to smooth it out, or wait for the patch panels? I know those are all viable answers, but given my lack of experience I am looking for experienced opinions. I want to do it, but I also do not want to be working on the bedsides for a foolish amount of time, because I have a long way to go. I am going in the next couple of days to look for some other tools that may help. Any advice?