What to swap for j10 styleside bed

[fivepack]

What would be an easy swap for a rusted out styleside bed. I have an 82 J10 long bed. would like to swap for a later model stepside from maybe a chevy, dodge, or ford.
Anyone tried this? What would be available in local junk yards that would be a close fit?

[BRUTUS]

I don't know that it would be EASY.... I have seen a couple of pictures of Chevy stepside beds on J10's... doesn't look too bad. The frame rails on Jtrucks are wider than chevy/ford/dodge so you will have to do some creative fabrication to get the gas filler neck and mounts to line up. Might even have to stretch the bed side to side to get it to lay over the frame rails right.

[J4GRAND]

Also, most of the stepsides from the "big three" are 6.5' beds; the long bed on your J10 is 8' so you would either have a large gap bed to cab or would have to shorten your frame. Even a short bed J10 is a 7' bed so it would be a little long.

[janie]

What would be an easy swap for a rusted out styleside bed. I have an 82 J10 long bed. would like to swap for a later model stepside from maybe a chevy, dodge, or ford.
Anyone tried this? What would be available in local junk yards that would be a close fit?

Is this the same truck Mani had posted up for the owner that you bought? I haven't gone back to look, but iirc I thought the bed looked decent and thought it was a shortbed.

If not, you may want to send FSJeeper a pm. IIRC he had a long bed for sale not to long ago.

If you bound and determined to swap for something else though, like the others have said. It's gonna be some serious fab work.

[fivepack]

Well it was a thought.

I'm in the early stages on this project and the flat part of the bed is ok, but the fender wells and back are pretty well shot. My son refers to it as bubbled up bondo.