Toolbox Organizer for the Farm Pickup

I was able to get a new farm pickup this year well actually I was able to get a new three-year old farm pickup this year that's about as new as it gets on our farm but I really like it and it's been a big upgrade from my previous ride and with the new pickup purchase comes the justification for a new toolbox purchase right now all my tools are loose in the toolbox which is a real pain for finding the wrench I need I decided to fabricate a tool organizer that would help me keep everything organized and sorted in the toolbox hopefully this will lower my time spent searching for the right wrench and increase my time spent fixing whatever is broken [Music] you I got the pickup up to the shop and started working on a game plan I thought the first thing to do would be to take inventory on the tools I had and get them sorted I got them loaded up and on to my loving table I organized the wrenches by size biggest the smallest and made sure I had two of each then I organized my sockets and a little surprised to find I wasn't missing any then I got my toolbox out of the pickup and onto my welding table as well the first thing I had to do was attempt to pound out this dent that I managed to get in my nice new toolbox within the first week of owning it I had something heavy in the bed of my pickup roll forward at a stop sign and make a nice instantly recognizable crunching noise serves me right for not taking the time to type things down I placed a heavy piece of metal on the outside and used a hammer on the inside to flatten it which worked pretty well actually so this little bit of aluminum work here is what caused me to put off this project for about a month I've only worked with aluminum a couple times and I was really nervous I was going to ruin the toolbox with this little modification I needed to make his upper step is where I wanted to place my socket tray so I needed to notch it out after marking the cut lines I used the angle grinder to make the cuts and then I used a flat disc to smooth it up a little bit now having notched out this big piece I felt like both fins were pretty weak one side was where the lift support was attached with a lot of weight on it and the other side held up the latch mechanism so I cut out a gusset from the scrap I just removed and nervously attempted to weld it in place like I said I've only welded aluminum I think three times now with hugely variable degrees of success I really don't know what I'm doing and I wish I was practicing on a piece of scrap instead of my new toolbox aluminum behaves so much more differently than mild steel does I ended up having to position the toolbox in ways that gave me the easiest weld positions doing this I was able to get and admittedly ugly but I think somewhat serviced full well and it's still closed like it should so pretty happy with that next I got to work on the socket tray I cut out a piece of sheet metal with plasma cutter that would be the base of the tray and clean up the edges the grinder I checked the fit in the tool box and it seemed all right I wanted to put an edge around the tray thinking I might keep things in place a little bit so I use my poor man's metal bender to bend some 1-inch strips to 10 degree corners I've been at one side and then marked and bent the other side then I started attacking it in place and once I was happy with the fit I went ahead and put some bigger welds on it next I laid out my sockets in a couple different configurations until I found one that I was happy with I marked the sinners and insider' punched them I drilled out the holes using the same size bit as the round rod I was planning on using for the half-inch drive sockets I used three-eighths inch rod but for the three-eighths inch drive socket I had to use 5/16 because it wouldn't fit on the larger rod I put some thought into how is it going to keep the round bar straight up and down while I plugged welded it from the underside I got a short piece of two inch square tubing and filled a hole all the way through both sides of it sliding the piece of rod through it and I could position it and clamp it in place now I knew the rod was straight and I could slide it inward until it was recessed about an eighth of an inch giving me just a little room for a strong plug weld I had to drill a couple more holes in my squared tubing block to get into the corners of the socket tray but I was able to use this process for all them and it worked really well figured out how high I wanted to cut them off at I decided they should be about a quarter inch lower than the tops of the sockets to cut them off with the angle grinder cutting them off after they were well then place worked well to keep them the same height versus trying to get them the same height from the beginning and then I ground the welds on the bottom of the socket tray smooth so it would sit flat in the toolbox I had to leave this space open for the lift spring otherwise the lid wouldn't have closed but the deep sockets fit behind it nicely the next day as I waited for the grass seed trucks to be filled I started on the bottom tray where I wanted my larger wrenches to be stored I took a similar approach making the tray first and then laying out the wrenches and marking where I wanted the pegs to go I decided on these that I would just weld the size of the pegs instead of going through the tray and welding the bottom like I previously did I also made a spot for a couple pipe wrenches and my hammer the next thing I needed to do was build some brackets that would hold these trays in place and I thought these brackets could also give my small wrenches a place to hang on the sides I also made a short tray to hold my three-eighths inch drive deep socket set just hoping to use a little more than empty space right in front in the middle of my toolbox I welded it to the underside of the socket tray and it stored the sockets kind of out of the way but still easily accessible I cut some plate that'll go on the side of the tool box and then mark locations for the pegs didn't worry as much about getting these ones oriented perfectly I just tacked them and then pump him around with a hammer a little bit to get them lined up close enough and called that good and it came back in and welded it solid i welded a piece of angle onto the backside that'll sit on the lip of the toolbox and then I drilled a couple holes in the corner of the socket tray that I'll use the bulky side pieces on I had to make everything small enough size that going to fit into the toolbox and then both together once it was in place because the toolbox opening is a little narrower than the floor of the box so it wasn't going to work to lower one solved structure straight into it I used to be sick cardstock paper to make a template the hole location and then I transferred the template onto a piece of metal and then once I had the bracket bolted on I could weld it to the side plate I cut another strip that will run down to the bottom of the tray and hold it in place and he did a slight espen in it to get to the outside of the bottom tray so I stuck it in the bench vise and gave it a couple precisely calculated whacks with the hammer this also needed to have one side be bolted on so I clamped the bottom in place and then welded the top to the side bracket planning on drilling the holes the bottom after I removed it out of the toolbox that was the last bit of fitting I need to do in place inside the toolbox so I broke everything down and removed it luckily I didn't have to go too far for some wrenches to undo the bolts I drilled the holes for the bottom tray then I marked some holes for my ratchets extensions and screwdrivers that I wanted to put in the front of the socket tray I use my plasma to cut some square holes for the ratchets and then drilled varying size holes for everything else that was the last bit of fabrication I needed to do so I came through and everything up with the wire brush and then wiped everything down with some lacquer thinner to remove any oils I hung him from the hoist and gave them a couple coats of paint the next day I was ready to put it all back together for the last time got my tool box up and into place this box is built out of some nice thick aluminum and feels really sturdy but it's nice that it's still light enough for me to pick up by myself I started dropping in the different parts and getting it bolted together I thought I was gonna have to bolt the trays through the bottom of the toolbox in a couple places but I found out that after locking all the pieces together I think it was an odd enough of a shape that they kind of held themselves in place and they didn't move at all I got some anti slip rubber mat material for the bottom tray it wasn't a perfect fit but I figured once the wrenches were in place that it would hold it down tight I got the wrenches loaded back up and then found a new home for the rest of my tools on the sliding trace I was so excited to be set up and have everything with me again I was making way too many trips from the field back up to the shop to grab a random tool I needed a little bit of organizational work goes a long ways especially in my cluttered life and I don't do it enough felt really good finishing up and closing the lid on this project [Music]

Channel: Rainfall Projects

Views: 2,335,919

Rating: 4.8796034 out of 5

Keywords: welding, metalworking, diy, pickup, toolbox, fabrication, farm, family farm, metal shop, wrenches

Id: uUOUQeyoyIA

Length: 13min 8sec (788 seconds)

Published: Sat Sep 03 2016

Reddit Comments

[u/xterraadam]

This fella does lots of neat projects and takes a pretty good approach to them. You might want to subscribe! (The fertilizer cart series is particularly interesting)

[u/mcm2363]

Is like to see someone do this for a gang box