Even though it's not too bad climbing in and out of the truck, I'm thinking ahead to Winter when you may not have good footing. GM offered a cool looking set of steps for $800, plus installation, and I thought that was a bit too much.
After going through the ColoradoFans.com forum, and doing some googling, I found a set of "iArmor" side steps for $300, with Free Shipping.
Took about five days to get here, and they arrived in excellent condition. I spent a few hours last night going through all the parts, and assembling the step to the support rails.
These are a nice design, made from square aluminum tubing, and the step sections appear to be die-cast aluminum, with a whole lotta bolts to secure them to the support rails.
Most of the welds look to be "acceptable" to me, as seen below, but one on the other rail assembly looked a little funky to me.
"OK" weld:
"Funky" weld:
Not as pretty as I'd like, and it sure ain't no "Stack of Dimes" weld!
These steps are "rated" to support 300lbs, and I think they'll be OK.
And we now have some fully-cured primer, ready to apply another layer of filler, followed by more sanding.
I'll get back on that tonight. I have to get some rattle can bedliner to spray the "pinch welds" with on the truck before I install the new steps. That will cover the RED paint on the under the rocker panel on the truck so it doesn't come blazing through the gaps and openings in the new steps, giving the truck a more "finished" appearance.