So I painted a car thanks to the help on this forum about 2-3 years ago. Now I'm back with another project. Its a 2009 Chevy Silverado 3500HD Crew cab Long bed Ex-work truck, it has the duramax diesel and Allison transmission.

It mainly has surface rust right now from the high way miles removing the paint behind wheels on the lower the fenders/doors. Some small rust starting to forum on the cab corners and rockers, but very minimal, I'm hopin I can remove/fix the rust and then try to prevent it from coming back as quickly with maybe POR15? Want to get some recommendations.

I picked up a replacement bed for it along with a tail gate, so I need to paint them white to match the rest of the truck.

heres the pictures







The bed was wrecked!!







replacement bed arrived





So mainly I need to get some recommendations on what to do to the bed, it has some surface rust on the underside, along with a little on some of the areas that the paint came off from lot of highway mileage.


The frame of the truck under the bed, I guess por15 would be the best bet? Should I also do the underside of the bed with por15? Clean up the rust first or go over it? I don't own a power washer, so I was just going to hose off everything, should I try to grind any of the rust off the frame, or just knock the loose stuff off and paint over the rest? How much POR15 do you think I will need? a gallon?

Then I can paint the bed white after? Should I seal the old paint with epoxy primer, and then do base clear or even Single stage it since its white?

Answered your other post on the poor15.

So plan of attack is.

Clean truck bed with wax and grease remover

Fix surface rust/dents and dings/do bodywork

Scuff entire bed

Clean again and tack

Spray epoxy primer only on bare metal and over any filler/bodywork

Tack rag some more

Spray base 2-3 coats for full coverage

spray Clear 2 coats



Does this sound like the proper series of events for success? Should I just spray the entire bed in epoxy primer, would that yeild better results or a longer lasting higher quality paint job?

personally i would be doing the entire bed in epoxy. i think id do some cavity wax(after all painting) in those cross rails and other areas,too.

tomsteve wrote:personally i would be doing the entire bed in epoxy. i think id do some cavity wax(after all painting) in those cross rails and other areas,too.

I plan to do the entire underneath of the bed with a rust preventative, I may use eastwoods Fast etch/rust converter type product on the rust after I hit it with a wire brush. I'll try to neutralize any of it I can reach and then paint the entire underside of the bed with Zero Rust.

Once thats done I will then move onto the exterior of the bed.