Hello!
It's been a while. Two back surgeries, bought a new house, moved the wife's business...excuses.
The only thing I really have to update are things I may have already posted in a different thread. But I can't find those threads so...figured i'd update my actual progress thread instead.
I got really tired of black 'corinthian leather' and uncomfortable seats. So the first thing I did was ditch the old captain's chairs in the front for a pair of brown leather seats from an Audi Q7. Not gunna pretend...my welding skills are awful (as we've already established on the exhaust update). But, new seats means new mounting brackets...
but function > form when it's inaccessible anyway. New brackets are in and the seats bolted right up without much fuss. I was even able to repurpose the power for the old heated seats to make the power seat functions work.
I think they look much better than the old seats...and they're much more comfortable.
Seats led to redoing the rest of the old black leather (and new carpet). I'd never done interior upholstery before so, this was new to me. I had an extra set of interior pieces from the '78 parts car I had, so I started with a piece that no one would really notice if it were screwed up. The headliner side pieces.
The material wasn't eXaCtLy what I had in mind, but....it was close enough. Thanks, Michael's! It looked well enough to try the next piece anyway. The panels under the rear side windows.
Doing these was a little trickier than I expected...that divot for the arm rest was not playing nice. Eventually, I replaced those buttons with antiqued brass too...much better with the brown.
Next up, door cards. Mine were total garbage, and I also have the later model doors with electric windows, so the donor car wasn't going to work (they weren't in the best of shape either). Tagboard to the rescue.
Thankfully, upholstering these things was easier than the backseat cards. Michaels ftw on providing new foam backing too. Also, for posterity, the bottom 1/3 of the door card is painted with sealant to prevent future water damage.
Nothing fancy for the door handles...just a nice interior paint. Three years later, it's holding up really well! (antiqued brass buttons didn't make it into the door cards. I liked them better without...)
The only bummer is how tightening the door handle pulls a crease into the fabric. I was eventually able to straighten it out using a heat gun (very lightly, and at a decent distance, lol)
After that, it was just the last few pieces Head liner windshield piece, rear bench, rear headliner piece, etc...
And installing it all back into the car...
The actual headliner was a no-go.
A. I ran out of fabric
B. uninstalling it was really hard
C. making a new one would have required sewing skills I do not possess (i'm working on it). The headliner is actually held up with back rods sewn into the fabric, and I wasn't about to botch that job. Besides, when you're sitting in the car, you don't even notice the headliner. For instance....I've owned this car for well over a decade and it took until this project to even realize that the fabric was perforated...
Needless to say, that puts it pretty low on my wants list