Projects Is this thing worth saving?

So I don't exactly like the look of jailbar fords as flatbeds and lucky me has this homemade trailer sitting next to my garage. I believe it's a pre f series bed it looks like this:



It's extremely rusty, probably from it being so close to the street getting all the road salt dumped on it when the plows go by.
I don't have the money to get an entirely new bed for my 47, so do you think I could work with this? I know the front part of the bed is pretty much gone, but I think the bed sides might be saveable.
What do you guys think?

Here's some closer pics of the rotted places.

Passenger side front of the bedside



Passenger back



back end



Drivers side front



And rear



I'll take pictures from the inside tommrow, it's too dark right now to do it.


thank you I'm advance.

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I think if you have a welder and more time than money it might be worth it. Depending on what else is available locally for the same price.

 

The heavy rust through looks to just be in easily patched flat areas. I'd say fix it!

 

Wouldn't bother me to fix it if there was nothing else around.
I'd most likely use square tube as crossmembers if the originals are rusted out.
The flat areas are pretty basic to repair.
If nothing else its some good practice and the nice part is both sides of most repairs will be easily accessable for hammer and dolly work.

 

Do you have fenders for the box?

 

Way better than no bed at all. Does look very usable.

 

Thanks for all the help guys, I guess I will fix it.

Unfortunately no I don't. I'm not too worried about those right now though.


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Then I would give it a go. Definitely a good welding project butt welds are always fun.

 

Do yourself a favor and spend 30 bucks on a needle scaler if you don't have one!

 

I think we've all fixed worse. As others have pointed out flat patches are easy to make. You have to be careful not to warp the metal when welding. But, no reason you can't make it like new with a little work. There is nothing good on TV this winter anyway.

 

If you think about the knowledge you would gain by doing these straight forward repairs on the bed, would pay you to do it.
The next time you look at a rust repair patch, you will have experience and a opinion.
You cant buy this, you can only earn it by doing the steps.

Is it worth it? maybe, if you have not done these repairs before, then yes.
If you already have been there and done this, you have better options, then maybe not worth it.
Myself I would have to fix it because is how I would learn.

 

Hmm, Never heard of one before, so I looked it up after your mention.
......I also vote, try to save it. You already have it, Go for it!

 

I'd sandblast first, not needle scale it. Sandblasting shouldn't be risky on the thicker metal of a pickup bed.

 

Needle scaler's have their place but they can be tough on thinner sheet metal. A frame or something isn't a problem, but you COULD easily beat the crap out of a thin body panel!

 

Just passing on what worked for me in a similar situation with similar materials. The one I got from HF is the smaller one and with the air pressure turned down a bit it worked awesome for me to get a lot of rust and remnants of undercoating off the insides of the fenders with no damage to the sheet metal whatsoever. You results may vary.....

 

At my age, I would rather watch chrome rust.....

 

I bought one in similar condition, worse even. So, yeah, that's usable steel. The rot looks confined to flat areas.

 

Bonus that there's a couple of '36 Plymouth artillery wheels on there, a pair of them that aren't trashed should be worth an easy $100. I'd fix it.

 

Thanks again I will be fixing it. I'll probably buy one of those harbor freight hand held sandblasers it'll work good enough to get the heavy stuff off

Well I have one. Other side is just a steelie.

Here's a couple pictures from the inside

Drivers front



Drivers rear




Passenger rear



Passenger front



Thanks for the help again, I really appreciate it.

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Found this one in a cornfield and offered the guy 100 bucks for it. He said "Really? A hundred bucks!-- sold!"
2 nice 16" wire wheels - tires were junk, but held air
a complete Model A front end with the wishbone cut and welded to a hitch-
and the bed ( fenders were pretty mashed up) but had a tailgate!
all used , sold, or given away!

 

Nice, I love hunting down old cars like that. Kinda funny looking for cars is usually what me and my buddies do when we hang out together.

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you done good !!!

 

Measure the inside width of the bed. '38-'41 beds are 46" inside width, '42-'47 beds are 49" inside width. The narrower '38-'41 bed won't sit down on the '42-'47 frame. The bed sides are the same. The fenders look similar but are not interchangeable. '38-'41 has gas filler in left rear fender and spare tire dimple in the right rear. No gas filler in '42-'47 fenders and spare tire dimple is in left rear.

 

The spare tire mount is on the left, and the inner width is 49" so I think it's right. Thanks

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Hey guys remember this thread? Well over the summer, in my little bits of free time I've been doing whatever I can to my truck, wich included taking that old trailer apart. Just in these past 2 days I kinda made a sorta jig to mount the 2 bedsides to the truck. ( I wanted to see if the truck sat as high in the back as i thought, and it does) I'm pretty sure I'll end up using at least the bedsides, 3 grand is a lot of money for basically a big metal box.

What they looked like when I took them apart



They look decently good, they're pretty straight all things considered, only had a few worries, one being this fantastic looking lead job.



And the rust in the top portion of the passenger bedside





I don't know how I'm going to end up fixing the rust, as I still don't have a welder, and I still want to get a 5 speed for the truck, I'd personally rather spend the money on the trans rather than a welder, so who knows maybe I'll end up gas welding it, last time I tried gas welding I sucked ass at it I didn't really know anything about welding then though so maybe I'll do better.

Oh and almost forgot I ended up this weekend getting fed up with it and almost giving up hope on the bedsides so I decided how about I put them together and mount them on the truck?






They look good to me makes me more into fixing them, the bed may not sit exactly where it's supposed to but it's pretty close they look good to me.


Ps: sorry Dad if you didn't want to be on the interweb.

 

Well, get creative

Look locally for F1 bed or bedsides, '48-50?, can't recall...beds are virtually he same, EXCEPT, the '42-'47's have a bolt on panel that goes in front of the fenders, the F1', it was made into the bed sides.

Next difference is the fenders mount studs, so you'd have to take the F1 fender studs out, redrill holes for proper '42-47 fenders-you have a pattern already- and bolt them on using carriage bolts.

Too bad your so far away, I've some decent '48 bedsides.

Oh...one more thing, as I recall, there's something just a bit different about the tailgate latches between the change over.

 

I still plan to use these, just a little harder than I thought they'd be.