Wow....a LOT of hard work. Should be very nice when finished. 
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- #22
Little more progress on disassembly. Steering wheel and shifter now removed and shipped to Dallas Custom Steering Wheel for recover and some extra goodies. While the steering wheel was off I replaced the high beam relay, as the high beams did not work but the flashers did. hope it all works when I get the steering wheel back on.
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- #23
Just gonna leave this right here.
My Irish wolfhound did a number on the rear seats- I wish I had gone with these seat covers!
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- #25
I like them so far! Fit as expected for seat covers. Only downside is they take forever to get and they smell pretty bad when new. Still not sure if they can be washed. But that would help soften up the material as well. I wish Melville and Moon made some for our cars. Saw them in Africa and they are very nice.
That looks incredibly satisfying. Time for an update?
Been looking all over the forum for pics of the Tru-Fit vinyl in an 80, and there are none!
Been looking all over the forum for pics of the Tru-Fit vinyl in an 80, and there are none!
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- #27
Thank you! It was a lot of hard work for sure, and with life interruptions and timing of parts took longer than expected. Overall so far I like the vinyl floor I ordered, however, it is deffinetly not an OEM style liner you might see, not is it really a drop in fit. It is very thick material however which was both good and bad. When installing it many times I had to get the heat gun out to warm up the material and get it into little nooks and crannies before installing the interior panels over it. I also used some 3M velcro in places to hold things like the wheel arches in place. As you can see in the pictures there are some places where the molding is not perfect or there is not enough material. It also comes with no instructions and could not find any example pictures on the internet. I installed it with as little cutting as possible for a good fit, simply to retain as much material and coverage as possible.
In the end I got the frontrunner rack (60 series size) installed with the Gamiviti legs. If you want adjustability up and down these are the legs to buy hands down. At the same time I installed the 2.5" Dobinsons lift front and rear. Due to an untimely brake failure I also had the brake booster replaced at the same time and have been driving it every day and loving it.
In the picture above you can see next to the drivers seat where the material simply wasn't enough to cover the gap going under the panel there. I did not cut anything off this edge.
Above you can see how there is excess material here. I wanted to keep it as high as possible to aid in catching material, but I need to somehow attach the corner behind the gas pedal to the dash as it prefers to fold inwards and gets in the way of your foot. Not a hazard, just annoying.
In the rear I left the large floor mat loose other than the edge that goes under the metal trim at the rear of the vehicle. This also needed some trimming, and both sides were not cut exactly the same from the manufacturer, so already it fit a little wonky but made it work. The wheel well arches were the pain and due to the poor mold shape and thick material this side pushes the plastic panel out of the retainer clips. These took a lot of heat and velcro to get into place, but they just don't fit that well. Will all probably get covered up by a drawer system in the future.
Here you can see in the back seat where the floor wrinkles up. Not much could be done about this. There are so many compound curves here it would be hard for them to make it fit right.
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- #28
Other goodies installed at the same time were the freshly wrapped steering wheel from Dallas Custom Steering Wheels, along with the Shifter handle by them as well. Very fast turnaround, decent price, and feels like great quality.
Also installed was the Delta VS center consul and shifter. This thing is built like a tank, however, I wish they would have just included all the hardware needed rather than reusing OEM stuff. The instructions for the shifter have you reusing factory bolts, through the thicker metal, and a spacer, neither of which are flexible like the OEM plastic. In the end had to go buy hardware which was longer to get it installed. Over all I would recommend though, the solid latch on the center console is so satisfying to use.
The entire car received second skin sound deadener and a combination of mostly 3/8" and some of the smaller closed cell foam. Floors, roof, doors, everything. It is much more quiet than it previously was, however, it picked up a bit of noise from the roof rack. I think the problem is the bars are vibrating, not necessarily wind noise. Ill probably attempt to come up with some kind of solution to essentially connect all he bars in the middle together to make it more one solid structure. It would be interesting to see the difference between this style where the bars are attached left and right vs something like a K9 where they are attached, and welded, front and rear. If that would reduce the ability of the bars to vibrate in the wind.
Also installed was the Delta VS center consul and shifter. This thing is built like a tank, however, I wish they would have just included all the hardware needed rather than reusing OEM stuff. The instructions for the shifter have you reusing factory bolts, through the thicker metal, and a spacer, neither of which are flexible like the OEM plastic. In the end had to go buy hardware which was longer to get it installed. Over all I would recommend though, the solid latch on the center console is so satisfying to use.
The entire car received second skin sound deadener and a combination of mostly 3/8" and some of the smaller closed cell foam. Floors, roof, doors, everything. It is much more quiet than it previously was, however, it picked up a bit of noise from the roof rack. I think the problem is the bars are vibrating, not necessarily wind noise. Ill probably attempt to come up with some kind of solution to essentially connect all he bars in the middle together to make it more one solid structure. It would be interesting to see the difference between this style where the bars are attached left and right vs something like a K9 where they are attached, and welded, front and rear. If that would reduce the ability of the bars to vibrate in the wind.
I have this color too, Nightshadow Pearl.
Stunning color! Mine is for sale, CA LC.
Stunning color! Mine is for sale, CA LC.
