botboy
1/2 ton status
With a little help, of course 
Today me and a couple buddies pulled off the (very rusty) drivers side bedside from my '71 K5. Took us around 2 hours total, 2 guys working and one bull****ting. a few notes:
1) The matco man sold me a matco brand spot-weld cutter, 2 extra cutting blades and an extra guide pin in a kit for just under $60. Definitely one of the best tool purchases I've made recently. Only thing I would have changed would be that I should have started with a corded drill (the cordless went dead after about 4 spot welds), and to upgrade the cordless drill I was using to a hammer-drill or something heavier that has two handles. The instructions with the matco kit suggested a punch for marking a spot for the center pin, but I found that it works fine as long as you start slow with light pressure to cut a small ridge into the metal, and the bit will stay in that as long as it made a full 360* cut for the full cut.
2) The factory assembly manual is good for seeing where/how the factory welded and assembled things. Definitely worth the $30 or so I bought mine off ebay for.
3) I used an electric grinder to separate the arc welds between the bedside and rear sill, and the 2 between the bedside and door striker plate panel, but a cutoff grinder and 2-3" blade probably would have made less carnage while getting the job done.
4) tightening fasteners to snap them off is faster and easier than attempting to remove them by loosening on a 35 year old truck.
5) on the rear sill bolts, make sure to knock them out after snapping them off, or you'll bend up the bottom of the metal tube the taillight mounts into when removing the bedside.
6) The spotwelds on inside (behind the front pair of seats) are far easier to remove if the roll bar is removed
The eventual goal of this work (I'll try and post up pics tomorrow, I left the digi at home and came to a buddies to chill) is to replace the entire rear sill and patch up the bed floor as necessary. There's a host of other items that also need to be replaced, but for now I'm going to start with the rear sill and bed floor, replace rocker boxes and cover panels, inner/outer rockers and front cab supports before the bedsides actually make their way back onto the truck.
Today me and a couple buddies pulled off the (very rusty) drivers side bedside from my '71 K5. Took us around 2 hours total, 2 guys working and one bull****ting. a few notes:
1) The matco man sold me a matco brand spot-weld cutter, 2 extra cutting blades and an extra guide pin in a kit for just under $60. Definitely one of the best tool purchases I've made recently. Only thing I would have changed would be that I should have started with a corded drill (the cordless went dead after about 4 spot welds), and to upgrade the cordless drill I was using to a hammer-drill or something heavier that has two handles. The instructions with the matco kit suggested a punch for marking a spot for the center pin, but I found that it works fine as long as you start slow with light pressure to cut a small ridge into the metal, and the bit will stay in that as long as it made a full 360* cut for the full cut.
2) The factory assembly manual is good for seeing where/how the factory welded and assembled things. Definitely worth the $30 or so I bought mine off ebay for.
3) I used an electric grinder to separate the arc welds between the bedside and rear sill, and the 2 between the bedside and door striker plate panel, but a cutoff grinder and 2-3" blade probably would have made less carnage while getting the job done.
4) tightening fasteners to snap them off is faster and easier than attempting to remove them by loosening on a 35 year old truck.
5) on the rear sill bolts, make sure to knock them out after snapping them off, or you'll bend up the bottom of the metal tube the taillight mounts into when removing the bedside.
6) The spotwelds on inside (behind the front pair of seats) are far easier to remove if the roll bar is removed
The eventual goal of this work (I'll try and post up pics tomorrow, I left the digi at home and came to a buddies to chill) is to replace the entire rear sill and patch up the bed floor as necessary. There's a host of other items that also need to be replaced, but for now I'm going to start with the rear sill and bed floor, replace rocker boxes and cover panels, inner/outer rockers and front cab supports before the bedsides actually make their way back onto the truck.
