Aftermarket body parts for the shop truck

Fixing up the old rust bucket, I have been trying to find good used O E M parts from the southwest, all gone. Trying to find aftermarket stuff but what is any good? I have heard horror stories about poor fit and thin material in the aftermarket parts business. I hear some good things about Goodmark parts. How do you buy the stuff, their website is a bad joke and if you call the number provided it goes to a call center in the Philippines with an operator that has no clue. Anyone know who sells parts that are any good?

It's hard without knowing what truck it is (age/make) but there are super cheap parts and then the better ones which are CAPA approved.

If it's an older truck, AMD makes the best parts. Goodmark is so-so.

'90 Chevy 3500 1 ton dually. Yeah go tell me to buy a new one, no f-ing way, 65,000 for a truck I need a ladder to get into! I just put 1,000 miles on a 2021 Ford 350 nice truck but the seat height is 12" higher then my old Chevy and so is the bed. Loading and unloading is a huge pita. It still has an axle between the wheels so it has no more ground clearance than my old Chevy, WTF? Now I see advertised a new truck with a tailgate that is a ladder as well, lower the thing and a normal tailgate will be fine. What does that foot of space between the tire and the wheel well get you anyway?

Im with you man, no idea why these new trucks are so tall, pita.
I bought a pre painted fender off ebay, fit was ok color was just a little off not bad.
Much cheaper than bodyshop.

Classic industries should have all you want

I'm with ya on the tall trucks, I have an 18 ram 3500 and have trouble getting in it, I'm 6'8 and it is way too tall for no reason.
I will be looking at how to make it shorter next summer


1990 Chevrolet Truck Parts | Body Panels | Front Fenders | Classic

Agreed. It's outrageous what a 3/4 ton truck costs. And they have become ass-clown trucks, too. Way too high, way too many shiny features meant to attract flies. I see 5 year old trucks with 80K miles being advertised for $65K.

If your looking for patch panels, not sure.

If your looking for bolt on pieces hood, doors, fenders tailgate check with a body shop and see if they can bring in the pieces for you. One of the shops next to me that does motor swaps occasionally does a door or fender and apparently there is a network of used parts that the body shops have access to.

Is there a shop in your area that sells paint and supplies to auto body shops?

Usually they know what's junk and what's not and although you'd pay more you'd at least get decent parts.

I'm making my rockers and cab corners out of stainless. I want to buy front fenders and wheel wells and maybe doors. The original doors are not too bad.

GregSY said:

It's hard without knowing what truck it is (age/make) but there are super cheap parts and then the better ones which are CAPA approved.

If it's an older truck, AMD makes the best parts. Goodmark is so-so.

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Those fenders are for the older generation. "box body'. My truck is a 3500 with the bodywork that was used till '98 or so. It is a bit of a pita because Chevy says it does not exist, all 3500s in 1990 are supposed to be the old style bodywork. Anytime I need to get parts from Chevy I have to provide the VIN number. I don't see a listing for fenders for my truck from AMD.

car-parts.com I have a classic terc and have gotten good parts from every yard I have used.

memphisjed said:

car-parts.com I have a classic terc and have gotten good parts from every yard I have used.

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Sold out of new ones.

Now is not a good time to buy anything.

Well the extra height is for the short dick crowd.

Seems pretty much universal that after market body parts will need work to get them to fit
90 is too new to work on in these parts anything newer then 75 is a pain smog.
Now if it was a ford could set you up with a compleat truck if you came and got it.
You might try calling a junk yard out here and give tell em its for one of the models
That GM believes uses those parts, that’s in the age group that gets junked for one reason or another
Out here.

thermite said:

Whole market is tight for used vehicles, complete, as well as parts.

Prices for yet-another MOPAR van (I consider them consumables) got so silly-high my latest Town & Country became a Range Rover Sport HSE Delooox with all options short of the motor-fellator.

For the same money. Or less.

Maintenance costs? Out the A**, bleeding, of course. Its a Land Rover. Not a Cornbinder or Studebaker pickup.

BFD. At least I HAVE something for my spend & labour.

Aluminium body panels, for example.

Fought Appalachian / mid-Atlantic rust-belt cancer for far too many years. It didn't learn a g-dam' thing.

So I learned.

My other "shop truck" is an ALL aluminium XJ8-L. Didn't need a Grumman step-van's capacity!

And it keeps the maintenance headaches on the same page so special tools are dual-use!

You have a Tig rig arredy?

Get you an English wheel, hammers, leather and sandbags.
Start forming 'loominum!

Didja know that all those fancy hand-crafted Big Bucks eye-talian 'loominum-body sporty cars don't even match, left side to the right side?

But they still sell for brazillions of dollars.... because nobody has yet been born with their eyes far enough apart to SEE both sides at the same time!

If it looks good => It IS good.

Aftermarket body....?? See also purdy Ladies. Talk about ass-y-metrical!

But they don't RUST, do they?

We do!

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Range Rover, you would have been better off with the overpriced Chrysler. when all the steel under that loomnum rusts away you will still have a pile of body panels! Yes I have had a TIG for about 40 years. And a power hammer and a wheel and all manner of tools and the knowledge to make rust repair parts of stainless steel. Aluminum corrodes like mad when it is exposed to road salt and steel. Yes I have spent enough time on Italian shit boxes to know all about the can't see both sides as once deal. And Aston Martins are no prize ether.

Did you try Classic Industries?

thermite said:

Somebody may have a pile of chemical salts. So long as it outlives ME? I won't be the one caring!

Why'd yah THINK I bought "interesting" (read "high maintenance") wheels so LATE in life? Put fewer than 300 miles on the XJ8-L in 12 months, first year of COVID!

Too OLD for hulls (hole in the water into which you throw money), wings (hole in the air in which you burn money) or high-heels (hole which makes money simply vanish)...

..may as well be wheels, largely decorative!

BTW: Aston-Martin was simply a tractor-maker's experiment to determine how heavy one could build a two-holer before it sunk vertically into the roadway whilst parked. They were only built fast to escape the evidence on public roads before an Austin feel into their wheel ruts and vanished..



"In theory.." Loominum is so active as to combine with anything but misplaced virtue and form a salt. It even makes good rocket fuel.

In practice, the self-healing ALOX skin actually works a treat, Grumman step-van to SEVERAL motorcars. Just not ALL of them.

Others - most of them, at the outset, got the simple s**t wrong, such as fasteners and other points of contact. See Volvo, VW/Audi, Ford-other-than-Jaguar, and not-only, just for "modern" volume-production mistakes.

In practice it can be made to work BETTER than Stainless as far as longevity.

Not that I mind you fab yourself a shop truck out of stainless, either.

And/or Carbon fiber.

Given we do know your background and shop.. why didja think I figured you for the LAST guy to be seeking rust-fuel to refill a rust-generator?

The s**t isn't called a "cancer" for no reason. It IS akin to a biological infection.

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I'm 65, over half dead anyway, I can fix it to outlast me so it will be fine. Last truck I will buy considering the height they are building them now.

I remember my father saying as he turned 60 he didn't have many years left to live. He made it to 93. I'm still not sure if he was right or wrong.

moonlight machine said:

'90 Chevy 3500 1 ton dually. Yeah go tell me to buy a new one, no f-ing way, 65,000 for a truck I need a ladder to get into! I just put 1,000 miles on a 2021 Ford 350 nice truck but the seat height is 12" higher then my old Chevy and so is the bed. Loading and unloading is a huge pita. It still has an axle between the wheels so it has no more ground clearance than my old Chevy, WTF? Now I see advertised a new truck with a tailgate that is a ladder as well, lower the thing and a normal tailgate will be fine. What does that foot of space between the tire and the wheel well get you anyway?

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Keeps your um, <cough!> from dragging on the ground?

If it runs fine, just a bit “holy” it would be crazy not to fix up. Ask a local body shop who’s got decent fitting metal?

moonlight machine said:

I'm 65, over half dead anyway, I can fix it to outlast me so it will be fine. Last truck I will buy considering the height they are building them now.

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My Dad bought a new truck a few years ago. '18 F250. He just needed a plow truck for the street and driveway.
He wanted to buy used, but couldn't find a BASIC truck used.. Apparently people that buy BASIC trucks run them
into the ground. He wanted something he didn't have to fix all the time anymore. He got a really good deal...

I've been back there quite a few times since then.. Its a nice truck to drive. Mileage sucks.

The whole point here, I kind of lost track of that... TOO F'N TALL!! My Dad brought the truck home,
and went back the next day and bought the side steps.. Its stupid. Its NOT big inside, its tighter than
my '98 Dodge. And trying to get anything out of the bed is a F'n nightmare. Working on the tail gate
is a pain in the ass. My Dad is about 4 inches shorter than me (I'm not the milk man's, I look exactly like
both my parents, and they don't look like each other). My Dad has to use a milk crate to get ANYTHING out
of the bed over the side. I can at least get my arm over.

Wait a second. I went off again. Keeping your truck til you die. I get that. I'm 100% on
board with that. I don't need it everyday anymore. Its not rusted... It still runs, I can
reach into the bed. The interior has seen better days, the paint is horribly oxidized.. But
she runs. She drives good. I have a spare motor and tranny sitting here for when "That" day comes.

When I bought her, the salesman told me to come back in a year or two, trade her in, get another one.
I told him "Nope, I'm going to keep her for 15 to 20 years".. Today makes 20 years 4 months and 6 days,
And she was 3 years old when I got her. He laughed AT me.. I still have my truck, they went out of
business 5 years ago. I'd jump in her and drive her cross country tomorrow without a second thought.

So y'all can laugh. Here is my good old girl earlier this year bringing home my new daily driver.



And see.. I look just like my dad. Circa 1970something. He was taller than me then, that didn't
last long.