Had some time to finish up the inside of the tailgate. Fabricated a sheet metal plate to cover the latch mechanism. That just snaps into place. The carpet had already been cut and trimmed by Rays Upholstery, now we just had to fasten it. Didn't want to use trim screws, so took an idea from a full size Jeep Wagoneer which uses stainless wear strips. A trip to the local salvage yard yielded a hand full of usable strips. These were longer than needed plus the holes were in the wrong place for our usage. So cut the end off a test piece and practiced forming it around a piece of steel with chamfered edges. Finally got a method that was suitable and cut 4 of them to length then

formed the ends. Holes were then drilled in location and using a center punch formed a countersink for the #8 x 3/4" stainless screws. The finish on the strips is what was expected from having who knows what drug across them for 45 years, so I enlisted the services of Blue Mountain Metal Finishing to bring them to a high luster. And just like the wheels they did not disappoint. Before applying the carpet 3 rectangular indents in the tailgate had to be filled to create a flat surface. These are 3/8" deep, so grabbed some 3/8" thick plywood and cut out the shape and siliconed them fast. Strips of adhesive backed velcro was applied at the corners and edges 

between the wear strips to assist in holding it all in place. The wear strip locations were measured off and cinched down with the stainless screws.