bed relacement

[lpapa15]

I want to replace the bed on my 79 short bed fleetside 4x4.  What years am I limited to use as a relacement.  I want to make sure the exterior body lines match up for trim.  Also is there a difference in the measurements for 2wheel vs. 4wheel drive?

[beastie_3]

73-87...Tailgates are different http://forum.73-87chevytrucks.com/smforum/index.php?topic=15684.0

I dont know if trim holes are different.

[78 Chevyrado]

79 and up have doors for the gass filler, 73-78 have the exposed gas cap..   

[Old77]

If you're only worried about the body lines you can use any bed from 73-87.

As "78 Chevyrado" mentioned, though, the early years just had the caps sticking of the bed sides while the later years had doors so something like that may matter to you. When I replaced the bed on my truck, if found a good solid one that had no rust in it (but had to drive 200 miles one way to get it) and I think it's off an 84 or something (mine's a 77). I was shaving the gas filler holes/doors anyway so that kind of thing didn't matter to me but all the body lines match up perfectly. I went ahead and put a '77 tailgate on, too, (bought new from  ) and everything matched up great.

I hope this helps.

[Swims350]

well the trim on the 80 and olders or whatever years had tons of holes in the body for it to mount, the later styles had only lower molding and was glued on, except for a couple holes in the back corners. So I'd think you'd need to make all those holes or fill all the old ones or something unless you find a bed with molding holes already.