Posted by Clint Dixon on Monday, March 24, 2003 at 12:05PM :
In Reply to: Re: Interesting.... posted by Marty on Monday, March 24, 2003 at 11:17AM :
I just took a closer look. All but one of the 1-inch or so narrow pieces are located at the very edges of the boards. So, they are held in place by the skid strips. Actually, if you add to these narrow pieces, the width of the wood that goes under the skid strip, this makes the narrow pieces about 1-1/2" wide at the widest end. The wider sections of boards, if not wide enough to reach to the skid strips, and to be held in place by them, are held in place either by the additional factory bolts at the very front of the box (one evenly spaced between each skid strip, these also attach the front panel) or by the large washers through which the bed-to-frame bolts pass. I have only one 1-inch wide piece that is held in place by nothing but the tailgate and the full metal plate that someone bolted to the bed many years ago. I do have a couple of narrow pieces that begin at the tailgate (held in place by a skid strip) and taper off to nothing about half way to the front of the box. The wider piece next to it of course then passes under the skid strip and is held in place by it. Maybe this is why the individual pieces have parallel sides, but the lines formed by the joints between the individual pieces do not follow parallel to the skid strips. By ripping the boards in this fashion, the narrow pieces, when found at the very sides of the boards, taper off to nothing, so the skid strips are making contact with more than just the narrow pieces at the sides.
I need to see about getting some storage area so I can post photos. Another collector just sent photos of his bed to me. A very nicely preserved original that also has thinner, sometimes tapered, individual pieces making up the boards.
I am not saying this is the best route to take when replacing wood in one's pickup bed. Though, I do think it is interesting that, at least some of the trucks, used this method of laminating narrow pieces of boards together. I have seen severall like this at the VPW Rallys.
Clint