i think its pretty good, like everyone else, im not to pleased on the carpet, but all in all, a nice job. what about putting some gas shocks on each side so that you dont hafta use that piece to hold it up?? also maybe you should have made like a frame that fit right into the bed, maybe an inch square just so that the hinges dont get all that stress as you go around corners as the cover tries to slide off.

i think im gonna try it, except i might try mine to be a fiberglass flush mount.

 

X2 i going to try fiberglass too

 

I thought i'd report back, its been like 2 weeks or something and its rained on it real hard several times, even hail, not to mention alot of humidity and not even a single sign of warp yet.

 

Nice job, I did the same thing to a Chevy shortbox I had many years ago. Covered mine with a vinyl cloth material and it had no problems with rain or snow.

 

I really like how your truck looks with it on. You did good work.

 

Update as promised - 3 months later:

Still straight no warping even with high heat and humidity, lots of rain and all that jazz.




Added the gas shocks


and this picture shows how straight it still is - NO WARPING!



and just for giggles, this is my painted bezel

 

I like it! I might have to do that for mine. I would use piano hinges though.

 

:-D lol! i JUST posted the update.

 

very nice man .... good to see its still holdin up

 

How does it lock down?

 

with those chains hanging down. They clip to the tie downs in the bed.

 

I'm on board man. regardless if it lasts 5 days or 5 years, I'm certainly not creative like that. I say thumbs up for making it yourself and doing something different. Rock on.

 

hey 60 bucks and keeping yourself busy on your truck, great idea

 

hey 60 bucks and keeping yourself busy on your truck, great idea

 

i know this is old but im thinking of doing this and also thinking of fiber glassing it so i was looking for another up date still good?

 

Can't speak for the OP, but I have one that was on my '87 Jeep Comanchee for 4 years up in CT and, when I moved back to TX and couldn't get the poor 'ol Jeep to pass inspection here, got ported over to the '90 XLT that 'came with the house' here (it was in the backyard when I rented the place and the landlord gave me 100$ off the first months rent to use to have it towed to the junkyard, title was in the glovebox, so I signed, re-titled, registered, inspected and rebuilt the (trashed) tranny and have been driving it for the last 6 months... Mine is much thinner plywood (can't recall how thick, but it was the super cheap stuff) and has only been treated with a gallon of the cheap Wal-Mart bed liner... Survived 4 years of heavy snow up in Shelton CT and so far 6-7 months of rain and TX weather... I wouldn't want to carry my wife's 18th century first edition collection back there during a monsoon (being married to an English Professor is not all it's trumped up to be in the mass media ), but I carry groceries home in the rain in that little front section all the time and stuff stays dry enough... There's a bead on black silicon there between the front (hinged) section and that back (static) section that keeps 99% of the water out and if you really cared, you could run one around the edges or use some inner tube type rubber to make a bridge gasket of some sort that would be more dry - for my purposes, it works great...

(obligatory pics)

You can see the whole deal from here... The rings are threaded into nuts that are welded to the bedrail over holes that let the rings screw in and hold the rear section down... The strip between the rear rings is one of those "Line of Fire" type led taillight/turnsignals that you always see on eBay/at Flea Markets that my 'ricer' buddy gave me and I dropped in a routed channel and siliconed up (probably the biggest source of leakage in the whole deal and I'd suggest avoiding that mod, lol! ) (If you look, you can also see my custom cane holder (a.k.a. cheapy Wal-Mart gunrack) and Pedro, my dashboard Chihuahua with the bobbing head (I live in rather 'ethnic' area of Dallas and it's camouflage - hasn't been broken into since Pedro took over dash duty !! )


up front, the hinged section is held down with a couple of hood pins... I've only had them stolen once, the used to have the little cables on them to prevent them from walking away... The hinges are just cheap 3$ gate hinges from Wal-Mart (there's a cheap xxxxxx from Wal-Mart theme going here, huh?) You can also see the little slots cut in the front section wrapped in a little piece of cut out of flashing sheet metal that allow the front to fold back over the rings in the rear section to let it lie (99%) flat


Opened up front section, you can see you thin the plywood is and you can see that there's a bit of warpage, but it's almost 5 years old - I'd go with a thicker piece if I re-did it


with the front section folded all the way back, you can see how the slots let the rings poke through... You could get around the rings and the extra holes by using bolts or something else... I used the rings because I could just twist them out like a wing nut and I occasionally threw something on the back (before the taillight) and could just lash it down... I wouldn't probably walk on it, but it's held up pretty well

It's definitely 'ghetto', but for what I put into it (maybe 50$) it's worked great, done what I needed and, if you cared more about how it looks, you could certainly do a cleaner version... But, the basic idea 'holds up' well in the long run I think

-=- gurudude

 

Thats not for me at all, however, I must say... pretty damn good job! It looks pretty tight on there! Nice work Chief!

 

Yea not for me, not because i dont like the work i just dont like bed covers. but way to go on both of ya for great ideas. Trust me there is rigging and doing it your way and yall just did it your way.

 

looks pretty good for homemade, but does it latch?

 

Hmm, this makes my brain start working. Thinking about using some L-shape aluminum to make the frame and then wrap it with some sort of weather/water proof cloth and then mounting it up. Just have to work out how to keep the water out.

 

i saw go for it man!

 

hows it holding up Crackerstien? It looks great, I would just be concerned about it being made out of wood.

 

I did the same thing with my old ranger , but mounted it flush inside the rails. mine was on for a good year without any problems. Bottom line is if it works for u who cares what others think of it. Call me redneck but i have made alot of home made projects and saved lots of money.