To be fair, it was packaged as I would expect. I think someone dropped it prior to packaging.

Honestly, this is the main reason I rarely use ebay. In this case, the $150 difference was enough to give it a shot. And, I'll use it if there's something I can't find elsewhere.

I'm planning on building a tonneau cover to fit my truck with a cross bed toolbox out of plywood with something like a 1x2 under frame. I talked to Tamco technical (owner maybe? can't remember his name but he's passionate about their products) about using the urethane primer over wood. He said he has a customer that does that and said I need to thin it fairly thin so the primer can soak into the wood. I've got the ratios around here somewhere, we talked about a bunch of stuff and I had to take notes!

Where I'm heading with this is that I'm going to take a scrap piece of plywood to practice on. It will also serve as a spray out board.

Concerning the bleeder gun conversions I'm doing, after reading your previous posts about you using one, I decided to convert because I caught myself not triggering the air quick enough. Figured a bleeder would solve that issue. It makes sense that it would help stabilize the air temperature as well.

Thanks again!!

Hey, I don't know if you saw this or not but I just built a hard shell bed cover for my Dodge Charger Truck build. The build starts on this page.... viewtopic.php?f=12&t=27971&start=100
I went even lighter than you are planning. I built a 1 x3 framework and attached 1/4 inch luan to it (screws, glue, air staples) and then laid 1 & 1/2 ounce epoxy compatible matt with marine grade epoxy resin over that. I then shot two fairly heavy coats of Raptor bed liner over that. Once that cured for a few days I added an aluminum perimeter frame along with some extra angle iron up underneath for my hydraulic ram attachments. I ended up with a cover weighing under 70 pounds and it is very stiff. It turned out better than some factory units I've seen.

Now that's just too cool!!

I'm building my own tonneau for much the same reason as you, no one makes what I want. They do make them for full sized pickups with a cross bed toolbox, but not the Ranger.

I plan on building the cover sized to fit between the bed rails, and then use aluminum "T" bar attached to the sides of the cover to give it a lip to rest on the bed rail for a more lower profile look. The cover will be split into ~2' sections so I can fold it and for easier handling if I need to remove it. I plan on using hidden stainless steel hinges to join the two sections. I have come cam lock clamps from an old folding tonneau that I'll use to secure it to the bed.

I hadn't thought of using bedliner but I like that idea. The "T" bars are flat black and I was trying to figure out how to do a flat black paint. Bedliner solves that problem. But, I don't think I'll do the fiberglass. I'm not that skilled with using it.

Just curious, how did you deal with the loss of rigidity converting the car to a truck? I read where Honda wanted the Ridgeline to look more like a pickup and removed the sail panel which was used as a structural member. They had to redesign the unibody to compensate.

So that is one thing you don't have to worry about with the Smyth kits. He has a full time engineer that mocks all this up on computer. They know where the loads are....my kit for example.... The door pillars inbetween the front and rear doors are of tremendous strength in the Charger design. He makes these aluminum "winglets" that go from top to bottom and go on with about 20 rivets per side. The entire bed then bolts to those and more cross beams are added under the bed floor which also bolt down to the chassis. More and more rivets are added throughout the bed all the way back. The rear window and the bed floor itself become structural elements with all of this as well. Honestly, this "truck" is even stiffer than the previous car was.....
Ohh, and the Raptor bedliner....can't say enough about how well that stuff works... just get it with Shutz gun that fits in their containers and try to run it at 70 psi. I did that entire bed cover inside/outside with one container.....

DarrelK

I just finished reading through that whole thread. Awesome project with awesome results! Also impressed with how you got the younger generation involved.

Love the color. Years ago, we called it flip-flop black.

The only thing I saw that I would do differently is that I would have shaped the end of the tonneau cover to match the tailgate shape. \_____/ (not very good at drawing with a keyboard). I think it would have looked a bit more "finished". But, that's just me. It's your truck and I'm impressed with your skills.

On a different note, I still haven't heard back from the seller about the damaged turbine. So, I'm done with them. I have decided I want another one and went ahead and paid more to get one from a different supplier. I think I'm enjoying playing with this stuff way too much.

After seeing your work with the Sprayfine gun, I'm thinking of trying one out. They're much less than the guns I have but appear to do really well, judging by how your paint job turned out.

Can't have too many toys to play with!

Yeah, the only reason I did not do a little more shaping at those rear corners is I was thinking I would build (over the winter) a carbon fiber wing that would shape down to those squared off edges. I will mimic the profile of the cab for my wing shape.
Yes, I was pretty impressed with that Sprayfine gun. It is very well built and seems to take advantage of the venturi effect for cfm throughput. I am currently using it in my wood shop for stain effects in both oil and water based. Even stepping back to a 4 stage I think it has a great output. Phil's pricing on them there is about the cheapest of any of the turbine guns.