New Truck Box

After 21+ years of faithful service, my old Chevy truck finally let me down. Yes, my plastic and upholstered center console box between the seats gave up the ghost. I thought briefly about replacing “olde paint”, but couldn’t bring myself to depart with an old friend, so I built a replacement box.

Having some leftover ¾” red oak that was donated from an earlier church project, I built a finger jointed box of roughly the same dimensions as the old box, 12” x 20” x 4½-7½” depth. The box top is a piece of edge joined oak dadoed into the box and left floating during the glue up, with the lid cut off the box using the table saw. The lid and the box were then oppositely rabbeted to form a lip. The box lid was joined with a leftover length of piano hinge. A simple handle was affixed with screws. The bottom of the box was closed up using ½” ship lapped oak planks screwed into the rabbeted box sides.

The box is affixed to the original pivoting hardware using T-nuts and threaded inserts.

The whole box, inside and out, was stained and sealed with a Watco® medium walnut Danish oil and Minwax® paste wax.

It’s not exactly the color matched and upholstered look of the original, but it serves as an armrest and most important of all, it holds stuff that otherwise migrates to those dark spaces beneath the seat. Who knows, perhaps I will get another 20+ years out of the old truck (perhaps not).

Thanks for looking in. All comments, criticisms, and complaints welcomed, though I may not respond to negative posts. Have a blessed Easter.

Greg48
”Gaudete in Domino Semper”

P.S. Todays my birthday, I’m still amazed I’ve made it this far.

-- Greg, No. Cal. - "Gaudete in Domino Semper"