You made your bed.......

Wow, what a week. We have had some crazy weather this last week.  I took off for week of vacation to get some stuff done.  I make a punch list and try to stick to it.  That was great right up until we had 5 tornados this week.  Kinda changes your outlook on your priorities.  These are from my back porch.  This is about a mile away.  It's hard to see all of it, but it was over 1/2 mile wide.  This is some big circulation that ended up destroying a lot of the town of El Reno, OK.

It was time to run for cover!

So, we had this 3 out of the 5 days I took off from work.  This was followed by 100 mph winds and 5.25" of rain according to my trusty rain gauge.

Hang on to your hat!  100 mph winds and  the ditches are full.....

Anyway, back to the subject at hand.  Hot rods. So we decided to attack the very item that started this whole build.  My bed. 
 A friend of mine, Bob Owens,  owns the ultimate salvage yard in the universe, Owens Salvage Company, in Wellington, TX.  Here's a link to his website.  http://www.owenssalvage.com  You won't be disappointed. 

  Bob calls me and tells me about this friend he has in  Fresno, CA. who has recently passed away.  He had a bed, a set of running boards and the panels that go between the bed and running boards for a 35-36.  His estate was being sold off and Bob was helping connect the right people with the right parts.

  The only catch was this bed was a shop truck bed back in the day.  It had tread plate welded inside the bed sides and the floor.  It was well done, but it was super HEAVY.  Which is not a bad thing , since the 35-36 are a little light in the rear and some extra weight could make it ride better.  It is going to work out great for throwing swap meet parts in the back and letting them roll around without worrying about it.

Bed sides are pretty decent.  Not something to make a concourse car out of, but perfect for a driver/shop truck.

 Most of the wood is in excellent shape. It looks bad, but it cleans right up. One small piece missing behind the sending unit access door.

Here it is in all her glory.  Tread plate mania.  It has been sitting for 30 years, so it has a lot of time to oxidize.  Someone got crazy mounting stuff to the bed flanges up top.  I'm thinking this may have had some sort of signage on it or maybe the guy had a fetish for tying things down.

 It had 2 coats of red paint and multiple layers of primer.

It's gonna require some DA time, but overall it looks ok.

I added a quick coat of satin finish enamel to preserve the bottom side.