Some people say don’t judge a book by its cover. We like to say don’t just a truck by its bed. A truck that doesn’t have any wear and tear is a truck that isn’t doing its job. Trucks were made to get dirty. If you use your truck for more than just making people thing you’re a person who works hard, your truck is going to take a beating every now and then.
While the mud and scrapes and scratches on your truck should be worn as a badge of honor, you probably want to get the longest lifespan out of your four-tired baby. When you get a scratch in the bed, it exposes the bare metal of the truck to the elements. As the bare metal gets wet and faces extreme temperatures, it becomes susceptible to rust. The scientific term for rust in the mechanic community is, “not good.” Some mechanics even refer to it as “a downright bummer.”
This is why, if you consider your truck a part of your family, you need to invest in spray on bedliners for it. A spray bedliner adds an extra layer of protection to the back of your truck, so that when your truck does heavy duty work, it comes out in shape that’s just as good as when you went in. If you’re ready to install a spray on liner in the bed of your truck, you should follow these simple tips:
Four Tips for Installing Your Own Spray on Truck Liner
- Rough it up.
We’re serious. After you remove any toolboxes, spare tires, and extra stuff from the back of your truck, you need to go over the bed with a rough grit sand paper. This gives the surface of your truck a roughened texture, which allows that spray on liner to have something to hold onto. - Clean her real good.
There’s no shame in having a dirty truck. That means it’s living a fulfilling life. However, before you apply a spray on liner, you want to give your truck the cleaning of a lifetime. You want to make sure that all of the dust is totally gone. Even a small speck of dust will create an air bubble when it dries. That air bubble will be a permanent reminder of the time you screwed up and didn’t clean your truck bed enough before applying a permanent bed liner. - Invest in good vinyl cutting tape.
Once your spray on liner is applied, it’s there to stay. This is great for the areas that you want it, but terrible if you get the spray on areas that you don’t want it. The trick to preventing over spray is using vinyl cutting tape. The material used with your spray on liner is so thick, that it just absorbs masking tape. If you tape your truck off with masking tape, when you go to remove it, it will just tear, and leave all the extra gunk behind.
Vinyl cutting tape on the other hand has a wire edge that cuts through the spray and gives you a clean, straight edge. You tape your truck off with vinyl cutting tape very carefully before applying the spray, when you’re done, you pull it off and voila! Your beautiful liner is done. - Read the manufacturer’s instructions.
Every truck liner manufacturer is a little different. This is not a “read the instructions as you go” or just figure it out on your own kind of situation. If you don’t know what you’re doing when you apply your spray on truck liner, you can really truck it up (see what we did there?). Before you ever open the lid to your spray on truck liner, read the instructions thoroughly, from start to finish.
We can’t stress this enough. Follow those instructions to a T. The last thing your want is to apply your bed liner wrong, and to have a huge reminder of the time your thought you’d save yourself like three minutes and skim over the instructions.
Have you ever installed a spray on truck liner? Do you have any great suggestions to share with other just beginning? Please share them in the comment section below.
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