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I am going to be starting on the final stage of my restoration within the month, the bed; and the stake pockets are the only pieces I think I can't fabricate on my own. Out of the six pockets, only the fronts are going to need repair, they rusted out on the bottom. I've done a lot of searching and I know that there are no commercial replacements. The F-1 pockets are not as tall or wide, so you can't cannibalise those either. I've fabricated a lot of small pieces for my restoration, but the curved stake bottoms are beyond my skill to make.
Just trying to put a feeler out there to see if anyone has a source for patches. I know this is a common problem, so I'm hoping someone has made them in the past.
Idea #2: the rear pockets seem to survive since there is a bigger hole for debris and moisture to escape, and I think they are basically the same size as the fronts. If someone had a trashed bed that they could cut the lower 3-4 inches of the pocket, that would work.
I can't remember who it was but somebody here actually fabricated the round bottoms out of bent exhaust pipe and it turned out looking real close and pretty good I thought. Hopefully someone will be by soon with more information about that thread.
Check out Six string whitley's post on pocket repair
Last edited by casper1999; Nov 21, 2020 at 08:02 PM.
Reason: Update
I think you are selling yourself short. Looking at your build thread I believe you could repair these yourself. What could go wrong, all you will do is waste a bit of metal.
Yep, there was a thread where somebody used exhaust elbows and they came out great. Not that long ago it seemed. I was lucky and managed to find an FTE member that cut out a couple stake pockets from a roached bed and sent them to me.
