How To Apply A Roll On Bed Liner

We put a roll on bed liner on a 1980 Plymouth Arrow Pickup. Ever seen one of those? These trucks are known for rusting out. This truck had it's share of rust and the bed looked rough. Here's what you do...

A good cleaning is the first step. Paint doesn't stick very well to grime. Then you sand to rough up the existing paint. This is really rough sanding. You just need the surface scratched up good. That's the secret to a coating that lasts. Finally, the bed paint goes on and this is the easy part. The paint is so thick and has so much texture, it's very easy to use. It's fun to watch an old truck bed changed right before your eyes.

For two years we've used our project bed liner. Don't get me wrong, it has some scratches. This is a work truck used for hauling all manner of rough stuff. But even with all that, the liner still looks very good. No peeling, no major problems. And, if you want to you can still repair the coating any time you want. It's a long-lasting cheap way to make an older truck look far better.

Several companies make bed liner paint. All are a polyurethane paint. The leading brand is Herculiner. Herculiner has three advantages:

It comes in kit form with all the needed supplies,
You can choose from several colors... not just black,
It has a thick texture, more like a professional liner.

The Herculiner bed liner kit is really worth a look.

A roll on bed liner is a cheap way to really dress up a rough looking truck bed. It's easy to apply and worth the effort.

Get more tips for your own roll on bed liner at our web page.


A Herculiner bed liner looks almost just like a much more expensive spray on bed liner. Here are a few tricks you may want to know about before installing the Herculiner.

1. Repair as you go...

One really good application for a roll on bed liner is an older truck. Just make sure you take care of the damaged areas as you go. Now the thick liner paint will cover a lot of damage. Just be sure to stop rust either by sanding it off. Another easier way to deal with rust is with a liquid rust converter. Just brush it on and rust is converted to primer...ready for paint.

2. Clean it right...

Get all the old grease and wax off with acetone or a regular automotive cleaner. That's to make sure the paint stays on and doesn't peel. Clean before sanding or the sanding can drive grime into the old paint. It seems the sanding would remove the wax and grease, but it just drives it into the paint. That's a bad situation.

3. Scratching paint is good...

No need for fine sanding, all you need is a really coarse abrasive to get a rough sanded finish. That's another way to make sure you get a good stick.

4. Putting it on is the easy part...

Preparation is the hard part. Actually applying the finish could hardly be easier. That's because of that thick textured paint. It covers rough spots and goes on very easy. It's almost like a thick paste.

5. Want color???

There are many bed liner paints to choose from. One advantage to Herculiner is the color choices. White, red, and gray are offered as well as the standard black.

The Herculiner bed liner compares in many ways to liners costing far more. Once you have a clean, sound surface, putting the coating on is very simple.

Get more tricks at http://BedLinerForTrucks.com for installing a roll on bed liner.

Truck bed mats look so simple that they appear to be nearly worthless. Let's face it, you're just looking at a big thick rubber mat or at most a carpet rug with a rubber back. Why would you need that and surely if you already have an expensive spray on liner you don't need more than that. Well, maybe there's more than meets the eye.

Impact Protection

Mats of rubber cannot be beat for protection from impact damage. That means slamming stuff into the pickup bed, accidentally or on purpose, will nearly never cause any damage at all under the mats. That's because this thick, tough rubber not only absorbs the energy of impact, it spreads it to a wider area making damage even less likely.

Another option for protecting from dents is one of those plastic drop in bed liners. Much more expensive than mats, plastic liners give up several advantages as well. For one, plastic liners aren't the easy-in and easy-out protection that you get with mats.

Stops Sliding

Load shifting makes for plenty of trouble. There's the potential for harm to the load itself for one. Then don't ever forget about how slipped loads can ruin the bed sides, front and tailgate as well. To say nothing of the danger to driver and passenger. No, sliding, slipping cargo does no good.

Rubber in mats keeps everything situated better. That's because it's made to be non-skid. Most of this material includes cords in strands to produce a tougher mat but it also increases friction between load and mat.

Liners Over Liners Too

You can sacrifice a cheap mat and protect a permanent liner and keep it cleaner if nothing else. As for dents, spray on liners offer up to about a quarter inch of padding thickness. Even that may not stop some dents that could be inflicted upon your pickup bed. An extra layer of protection slipped in when you anticipate it may be needed, may be the elimination of expensive problems.

Fast In And Out

Installing bed mats means roll it out and uninstalling one means roll it back up. Store it in the bed or out. It just makes a big, heavy roll, that's all. Heavy weight, the mats like mine in a full size pickup weigh in at about 60 to 70 pounds.

Truck bed mats offer serious protection for nearly nothing. As a sacrifice cover over more expensive liners, they offer good value and impact protection as good as any other option.

A roll on bed liner costs so much less than spray on liners, it's an attractive coating especially for older pickups that have little market value. But wouldn't it be better to spray it on?

It just seems reasonable that you get a better finish with a spray on coating than with a roll on or a brush on coating. This is one of those times when roll on may be just as good as spray.

Spraying on bed liner paint will certainly work fine. Each truck bed paint manufacturer has recommendations on the best guns to use and the best nozzles for best results. But at best using spray equipment means a time-consuming and messy clean-up.

Based on my personal experience rolling on a coating results in a finish that looks almost just like a sprayed on coat. How could that be?

The liner paint is so thick, it's almost like a gel. Then, in addition, the liquid contains all the rubber pieces as well. The combination of the thickness and the texture produces surprising results.

What happens is this.

As the gel-like paint dries it settles. By the time the coating dries, the settling just fills in whatever roller or brush marks were in the wet paint. The final finish then looks smooth and even, almost as if it were... sprayed on.

It really seems that you can skip the spray mess and just use a roll or brush to get a roll on bed liner.

Grab more tips for applying a roll on bed liner at our site.

New pickups cost so much, it really makes sense to guard your truck and help to make it last. One particular area that several pickups begin to display age quickly is in the bed. Specifically if a pickup truck hauls much of anything at all, wear and tear quickly soon add up to potential damage within the bed. Truck bed liners in many cases are added in as one of the initial accessories to either prevent harm within new trucks or to try to cease further problems in older trucks. Diverse designs and also varieties of pickup bed liners offer different positive attributes.

The original, stock pickup box mainly appears like something had been left off and also it was not quite carried out. The right bed liner may add a custom look as well as finish the pickup truck look in a means which will be personalized to you. Now that spray in bed liners come in several colors the option can there be to help make the bed match the design of the rest of the pickup truck. On the other hand, choosing from the other liners just like plastic material drop in liners as well as carpet liners too creates several choices to be produced even after you realize you'll need a liner for your pick up truck.

Looks aren't the only basis for liners, and maybe even the most effective reason. If severe safety is necessary and you perform some real work some liners excel at hard use. The proper plastic material bed liners specifically work nicely for tough and abrasive loads, just like concrete blocks or perhaps scrap. Ding security in those instances tend to be as important as scratch safety. Obtaining the best liner may make a genuine difference within the long-term life of a truck. Both plastic material liners and the correct spray in liners work in some actually rugged application.

However often liners cost you a great deal and maybe your more aged truck could compliment something with a lower entry price. That leaves out a few alternatives and leaves you with a few other good ones. The roll on bed liner with truck bed paint offers the look of the more costly spray in liner and also actually can make older trucks look much better but for far less money compared to professional versions. It makes for a discount liner. Another frequently overlooked option is available in the truck bed mats. Easy to miss, mats do some things much better than any kind of other bed protection option but cost practically nothing at all.

Picking from just about all your options in truck bed liners can possibly be quite the puzzle. Many options offer you some degree of protection however, many clearly tend to be outstanding for hard use. More resilient liners at times cost a lot though, yet at least one option presents actual impact and also scratch elimination for almost no cash. Then if you want to carry out some work yourself, it could be able to produce a look for your own truck that appears far more high priced than it in fact is. Possibilities for bed liners make it possible to get great looks and protection for not much expense.

A truck bed liner that will be for more than just looks must be able to stand some punishment.

Now granted, spray on bed liners are guaranteed and are truly tough coatings.

But for really rough service other options are likely better.

A plastic truck bed liner for example will work under the roughest of conditions.

Load concrete blocks on many bed liners are you get to look at a damaged liner or you get to find how the warranty works.

The drop in bed liners on the other hand can shrug off most sorts of damage.

That's why for really hard use a plastic bed liner is worth a look. Here's the thing though. Plastic liners that fit poorly often make serious,irritating noises. In addition, liners that move around often wear away paint too. That results in a "perfect"spot for rust and corrosion to get started.

A compromise solution is a DualLiner liner that combines plastic sides with a rubber truck bed mat on the floor. That adds to really useful protection.

Here's the deal. There are lots and lots of makers of bed coatings. Dare I say that all are similar. You can tell by looking that the .truck bed paint. that Rhino Linings, Speedliner and Line-x uses is a product quite different than the liner paint available to most of us.

But the liner paint that you can find at your auto parts store or even at Wally World is quite some tough stuff if not in the same league with the pro versions.

Herculiner is maybe the leader as you'll see it mentioned all over the place. I like the fact that it comes in lots of colors and comes in a kit that pretty well covers all that's needed to get the liner on. There are others though.

Plasti-Kote is what we used. The Plast-Kote product is plenty sticky. It stays on well though the finished coat is somewhat thin which is characteristic of these products. The texture in the paint is prone to tear out and is somewhat small.

DupliColor noted for touch up paint is a major player in this market as is Rustoleum another major paint company.

What A Liner is advertised as water based and as a polymer. That puts it in the easier to handle category and worth a look. It is not as wide-spread as these others though it shows up high on the Google search results...

DuraBak advertises as the leading producer of diy bedliners. These again are polyurethane liner paint and I'm not sure how DuraBak and Herculiner both can be the leaders but I'm sure if they say they are then they are...

Then MonstaLiner advertises as the world's toughest do it yourself liner and I like the looks of their kits and the reasonable clam that what you really need is 2 gallons of paint. That's more like it...

Truck bed paint comes in a quite large variety. All are somewhat similar and differ quite a bit from the pro versions.

Roll on really is about as good as spray. Here's the thing. The bed liner paint is textured which helps to hide all sorts of defects. There's also this to consider. Bed liner paint is made to build up a real coating. There is curing required for the liner paint. As curing happens the paint settles and the lines from brushing or rolling just fade together. Spray it on yourself and you get a finished result that is really not much different than a roll on liner.

Getting started is as simple as washing the bed. The wash is a must for a first step. Grease and wax found on truck beds are a sure trouble spot. It's a simple matter of washing and cleaning with an automotive cleaner made to remove wax and that will be the first step to success.

It's rough abraded surfaces that hold paint the best. So that's what is required... rough preparation. Rough sanding is the answer, not fine surfaces and careful work. Scratches hold the paint more so than any really smooth preparation. Get that and you get a better stick and less chance of peeling.

A bed liner kit from Herculiner or one of the other paint suppliers is a way to get all the supplies at one time. The kit probably will save money and certainly saves some time. Herculiner is just one of the brands offering the supplies in a kit.

Consider more paint too. A gallon is the standard recommended quantity. That is just barely enough to cover a full sized bed. The thicker the coat the better to a degree so get a bit more for better results.

Have reasonable expectations. The professional spray in bed liners go on thick and with a more high tech material than is available to do it yourself truck owners. Professional liners are tough and partly due to the material and partly due to the thickness of the coating. The thicker the liner the less likely the liner can be worn or scratched away anyway. Do it yourself bed liners are often plenty good enough but they generally are no match for the toughness of a much more expensive liner professionally put in.

The roll on bed liner offers real protection and better looks for any truck but especially for older ones that have had hard use. Thick liner paint goes on easy and is a fast way to improve the looks of a pickup. It takes some time for installation but the steps are simple and not so difficult. Another way to save truck beds is found in truck bed mats.