"BUILD: 1970 C10 LWB--->SWB “Jumping Cholla”

[loudchevy]

Just got the bed pieces back from the sand blaster. They turned out great and will save me tons of time of dirty parts stripping. I'm going to start welding the bed pan first, then move on to the sides. I also had the bottom bench seat blasted, it has some surface rust.

[Chaparralman1974]

Ah...now the fun part begins Scott! At least you are doing body work now and not in August. LOL

Clay

[pjmoreland]

I'm interested to see the process of splicing the rear section of each bedside on. It seems to me that the sloped bottom edge and the curved upper section would make it a challenge.

[loudchevy]

I started welding the floor back together last night. Made some good progress and ran out of wire and I was worried about running out of gas . I'm gonna get a new 12.5 pound spool and gas refill today so I'm ready for some weekend welding. I'm right within 1/16" from my precut measurements (minus the 12"/8" cuts) from inside wheel wells to outsides and the bed bolts measurements match up to the frame holes. I'm pretty satisfied with that.

[loudchevy]

Originally Posted by Chaparralman1974

Ah...now the fun part begins Scott! At least you are doing body work now and not in August. LOL
Clay

I love the fabrication challenge of piecing it back together. Hopefully, the bodywork is easier/better this time around with a little experience under my belt. It was actually under 80 degrees in the garage last night. 2 weeks ago when I was cutting the bed up it was still over 100. Finally Fall has arrived!

Originally Posted by pjmoreland

I'm interested to see the process of splicing the rear section of each bedside on. It seems to me that the sloped bottom edge and the curved upper section would make it a challenge.

I watched a handful of guys do it on YT before deciding I would go this route. User nicklear36 recommended Metalox How-to Video Shorten a Long Bed C10 1967-1972 - YouTube and I though it was put together very well and used his layouts for my cuts. The angle cut on the top is supposed to help fit the curved upper part come together. I can tell I’ll have a little bit of trimming and fitment to do on mine just by butting them up together. You’re correct on the sloped bottom edge, the cut back end is a little over an 1” shorter. Metalox just bent back the bottom lip so it lined up with the long panel edge and cut it back (around 17:45 of the video). I’ll post some pics of mine once complete.

[pjmoreland]

Originally Posted by loudchevy

nicklear36 recommended Metalox How-to Video Shorten a Long Bed C10 1967-1972 - YouTube

Wow. That's pretty neat. He makes it look easy.

[Chaparralman1974]

Hey Scott, if you need a new front bed panel, you are welcome to the one I removed off of the new bed that I got. It has a few dents in it, but otherwise it is ok. I opted to use the original front bed panel....that way I can say that it is the original bed with some replacement panels done to it...LOL.

Clay

[loudchevy]

The heavy lifting of welding the bedsides back together is done. I had the boy welding the inside panels while I sat back and slipped on a beer. Pretty fun day in the garage. Once we had all the pieces tacked together, we clamped them on the floor to get a better look at the new short box. Overall, everything came together pretty well from all the cuts that were made.

Just have another 1000 tack welds to close everything up and some time with the grinder/flap wheel to get it all clean and smoothed out. The floor has a bunch of holes from the PO and the top rails have just as many drilled in them as well. Those will all be filled in and the stake pockets will be shaved too. There are a couple of places with the metal is rusted through on the floor and one place on the inside side panel that need to be cut out and replaced. I will be able to use some of the sections that were cut out to patch everything. I bought a replacement panel for the passenger front side where the toolbox was that needs to be patched up as well. I think I mentioned in a post a while ago that I'm going to steal the gas door from my K5 and put it on the drivers side panel to feed the Boyd gas tank with fuel. I don't think there will enough room for the gas door and the side marker, so I think we will leave them out. The boy said the bedsides looked better without the markers and I agree with him.

I need to convert the dolly that the cab sat on so I can get the bed on it and move it around on wheels. Plus, I'm tired of working 8" off the ground

[loudchevy]

Just a few more pics

[loudchevy]

Originally Posted by Chaparralman1974

Hey Scott, if you need a new front bed panel, you are welcome to the one I removed off of the new bed that I got.
Clay

Clay, I might take you up on this offer. Mine has some holes and a little rust that needs to be cut out and placed. I need to stop by and see your cab soon.

[pjmoreland]

Originally Posted by loudchevy

The heavy lifting of welding the bedsides back together is done.

That went together nicely.

[loudchevy]

Originally Posted by pjmoreland

That went together nicely.

Ya, I'm pretty happy how it all came back together. I'll get a pic of that lower lip on the rear of the bed for ya.

[nicklear36]

Originally Posted by loudchevy

I love the fabrication challenge of piecing it back together. Hopefully, the bodywork is easier/better this time around with a little experience under my belt. It was actually under 80 degrees in the garage last night. 2 weeks ago when I was cutting the bed up it was still over 100. Finally Fall has arrived!



I watched a handful of guys do it on YT before deciding I would go this route. User nicklear36 recommended Metalox How-to Video Shorten a Long Bed C10 1967-1972 - YouTube and I though it was put together very well and used his layouts for my cuts. The angle cut on the top is supposed to help fit the curved upper part come together. I can tell I’ll have a little bit of trimming and fitment to do on mine just by butting them up together. You’re correct on the sloped bottom edge, the cut back end is a little over an 1” shorter. Metalox just bent back the bottom lip so it lined up with the long panel edge and cut it back (around 17:45 of the video). I’ll post some pics of mine once complete.

I'm glad that link helped out! That looks like a great chop

[zicc1835]

wow great progress pictures worth 1k words is a understatment looks fantastic

[loudchevy]

Here is the pic of that bottom rear lip. I bent over the bottom with some vise grips and will trim the excess where the blue dots are. Should look ok after a little hammer and dolly work.

I converted my cab dolly to a bed dolly yesterday evening. This height will be much better to finish the welding and grinding. You can see the passenger bed side has a little twist in it as the end is a few inches off the bed floor. The PO side swiped something along the wheel opening and I think that caused the twist. I'm going to repair the arch once I get everything fitted and bolted together. I was able to reduce the twist quite a bit just with a little body weight so there is some flex in it. I think bolting it to the floor removes the twist completely.

[loudchevy]

Originally Posted by nicklear36

I'm glad that link helped out! That looks like a great chop

Thanks for the recommendation!

Originally Posted by zicc1835

wow great progress pictures worth 1k words is a understatment looks fantastic

Thanks!

[Chaparralman1974]

It's really coming together nicely Scott!

The bed panel is yours whenever you want it.


Clay

[pjmoreland]

Originally Posted by loudchevy

Here is the pic of that bottom rear lip.

Thanks for the photos. Looks like it will clean up easily, and it's not visible when looking at the truck from a normal vantage point.

[loudchevy]

Short bed conversion update: The bed sides are done minus the dents in the wheel opening. I'm going to wait to try and clean up those once I have everything bolted back together. I shaved the stake bed openings/removed the boxes altogether. The PO had put 15ish holes in each top rail, so those all got filled in and sanded smooth.

The boy and I worked on the swiss cheese floor yesterday. All the holes drilled from the PO and some of the minor rust has all been cutout/replaced/welded in. It was great having AJ on the millermatic filling holes while I hunted for rust to replace/remove, cut the replacement patches, and had a few beers. It was a fun afternoon in the garage.

The floor still needs to have the welds ground from all the holes filled yesterday and the (2) 5 foot welds from shortening which I'm going to try and knock out over the next two evenings.

Not a lot of pics taken but here are the bed sides all welded and sanded smooth.

[Chaparralman1974]

Great job Scott! Your metal working skills are top notch! I had a devil of a time getting my sides straight.


Clay

[rodstored-72]

great job on the bedsides!! when you have a free few minutes you can swing by to the "eastside" and help me with a few "dings" on my bed!! LOL!!!

[loudchevy]

Grinding on the bed floor is done. Pulled out the 7" grinder with a sanding disc and made short work of it. The 4" grinder with sanding disc was taking forever but it did a great job finishing the welds smooth once the 7" hogged most of the weld away. I just have a few minor places to fill on the wheel tubs where I had to cut out the old rusted bed bolts and left cutting disc marks on the tub flanges, should be an easy weld and grind smooth job for another day this week. Also have a couple dents to bang out. The pile of grinding dust I swept up was ridiculous, I didn't have an empty Lite can handy for my usually reference pic.

Big thanks to Clay "Chaparralman1974" for the hook up on the front bed panel. He had an extra one laying around and it was in better shaped than mine, so I took him up on the offer when I went and checked out his K20 yesterday. Pretty neat to have met him from this forum/community.

Plan is to get the bedsides, wheel tubs, and the bottom of the floor in epoxy this weekend. I want to also get the bottom floor and inside tubs sprayed in Raptorliner and be done with them as well. I have some Eastwood Rust Encapsulator on its way to spray on the top of the floor before spraying that with epoxy. The top wasn't in the best condition. You can see the discoloration in the pics (mostly in the rear middle and drivers front) from where it started to pit. I was actually able to cut most of the bad metal out when I chopped the rear floor. The underside looks great.

Feels good to have this part done. Once everything is in epoxy, I want to get it all bolted up and start some filler and try to pull out a couple of dents in the bedsides. I still need to buy a tailgate, looks like that will cost between 400-450 bucks for OG metal . I don't really want to go repo on that piece.

[loudchevy]

Originally Posted by rodstored-72

great job on the bedsides!! when you have a free few minutes you can swing by to the "eastside" and help me with a few "dings" on my bed!! LOL!!!

Thanks! I might have a few free mins in 2026 . Did you make it out to Dino's? I was telling Clay we need to go next year and park the trucks and crack a few beers in some lawn chairs and hang out for the day! Lots of cool trucks to look at there.

[Chaparralman1974]

Man, that's a ton of grinding Scott.....I am tired just looking at the finished product. :-)

Clay

[loudchevy]

Productive weekend of primer and under coating. I got the bedsides, front panel, wheel tubs, bottom of the floor, and bottom section of my bench seat sprayed in epoxy primer. I also got the inside of the wheel tubs, front fender wells, and bottom of the floor covered in Raptorliner. I'll get the top of the floor done in primer this week and hopefully will have a new to me tailgate soon as well. The primer really brings out the dents