rss
Lining a Truck Toolbox
I bought a toolbox for my truck, but before I loaded it up with tools, I wanted to take steps to increase its expected serviceable life. One of the tools I carry is a hydraulic floor jack. This thing is heavy, and has a tendency to slide around. I didn't want it (and the other heavy, sliding-prone items it shares the box with) to hammer on the box. I grabbed some plywood I happened to have, and cut a section to fit the floor of the toolbox to protect the bottom. That left about 8-9" of plywood of the same length, so I cut that in half to make two ~4"-wide pieces. I nailed some scrap 2-by material to that to create a slot for end-caps, and made end-caps from some other scrap plywood I had lying around.
Each corner looks like this,
With the ends like this.
The end-caps hold the long walls vertical, and the 2-by bits nailed to the long walls keep the end-caps where they're supposed to be. So everything stays put, but it can all be disassembled and removed.
The end result looked like this:
Since the toolbox has seen a bit of actual use, you can see the dark gray places on the right half where the hydraulic floor jack's metal wheels have been sitting and sliding around. If you decide to build something like this, I'd recommend building the walls the full height on the inside of the toolbox; I noticed some scrapes where other tools have been rubbing on the inside walls. But for something thrown together quickly with materials already on hand, I'm satisfied with the result.
