What have you done to your Land Cruiser this week?

[patherfinderjake]

I've not tried Kydex for door skins. When I redid mine I used mahogany door skins I bought at the lumber yard. To do it over I'd probably use 1/8" Baltic birch plywood. The door skins worked great, but I believe baltic birch would be even stronger. The one thing I learned is that staples were needed... I tried only using contact cement. In the summer it gets hot enough inside a 40 in the summer to soften contact cement and the vinyl then came off.

I'm honestly not sure how the Kydex is going to take staples, hoping it will be OK. Will find out soon enough. I also have about 5 pallets of 1/8" MDF Pressboard in the warehouse if the Kydex ends up not working, but I'm confident it will be OK and last forever.

 

[steffan]

Got off at 0700 then pulled a 15 hour round trip with the family to pick this monstrosity up:

View attachment 3910165

what a beast!

 

[jayp2]

I'm honestly not sure how the Kydex is going to take staples, hoping it will be OK. Will find out soon enough. I also have about 5 pallets of 1/8" MDF Pressboard in the warehouse if the Kydex ends up not working, but I'm confident it will be OK and last forever.

kydex wont take staples.....drill it, bolt it etc.....but staples will fail spectacularly.....

would work well alone but not as a base to be covered.

 

[patherfinderjake]

kydex wont take staples.....drill it, bolt it etc.....but staples will fail spectacularly.....

would work well alone but not as a base to be covered.

kydex wont take staples.....drill it, bolt it etc.....but staples will fail spectacularly.....

would work well alone but not as a base to be covered.

Makes sense. I have considered just painting the Kydex rather than trying to cover it with a fabric. It will definitely withstand anything the beach is going to throw at it. My shop foreman just brought the "1st pass". He cut them out of 1/8" MDF so I can take them and "prefit" them and let him know if any adjustments need to be made. Unfortunately Wilbur is 300 miles away right now, so it will have to be this weekend.

 

[Ziffdaddy]

I’ve just been daily driving mine…getting mentally prepped for a trans/transfer drop and rebuild…but I did take a pic of my wife on the hood..I tried for a Tawny Kitaen pose but she was a little shy…lol I wish I had wiped off the hood first…eh well…

 

[jayp2]

Makes sense. I have considered just painting the Kydex rather than trying to cover it with a fabric. It will definitely withstand anything the beach is going to throw at it. My shop foreman just brought the "1st pass". He cut them out of 1/8" MDF so I can take them and "prefit" them and let him know if any adjustments need to be made. Unfortunately Wilbur is 300 miles away right now, so it will have to be this weekend.

they make kydex in a TON of colors....paint wont adhere well

 

[brian]

I tried for a Tawny Kitaen pose but she was a little shy…lol I wish I had wiped off the hood first…eh well…

ashamed to admit i had to look that one up....even though i was there then......

 

[DylanH239]

Adjusted the pedal height and slave cylinder. I never adjusted the pedal height after installing the new clutch master cylinder now it should be all good. The second pic is of the pedal stop I added a cotter pin after I took the picture and that’s sweat on the floor not brake fluid. It’s hot in Florida .I’m going to be adjusting the brake pedal height soon. Is there any adjustment like the clutch pedal or do I have to loosen the lock nut and turn the clevis? Thanks in advance!

 

[mattressking]

Adjusted the pedal height and slave cylinder. I never adjusted the pedal height after installing the new clutch master cylinder now it should be all good. The second pic is of the pedal stop I added a cotter pin after I took the picture and that’s sweat on the floor not brake fluid. It’s hot in Florida .I’m going to be adjusting the brake pedal height soon. Is there any adjustment like the clutch pedal or do I have to loosen the lock nut and turn the clevis? Thanks in advance!

All covered in the FSM...and yes it is in there. Cruisercult.com if you don't have the manuals.

 

[65swb45]

Adjusted the pedal height and slave cylinder. I never adjusted the pedal height after installing the new clutch master cylinder now it should be all good. The second pic is of the pedal stop I added a cotter pin after I took the picture and that’s sweat on the floor not brake fluid. It’s hot in Florida .I’m going to be adjusting the brake pedal height soon. Is there any adjustment like the clutch pedal or do I have to loosen the lock nut and turn the clevis? Thanks in advance!
View attachment 3910573View attachment 3910574

Bear in mind that if your brake light switch has been replaced by someone who is not familiar with the factory specs, you may not be able to adjust your pedal to factory specs.

 

[DylanH239]

Bear in mind that if your brake light switch has been replaced by someone who is not familiar with the factory specs, you may not be able to adjust your pedal to factory specs.

Ok thanks for the heads up I will go ahead and take a look. I might end up sharing some pictures here as well.

 

[patherfinderjake]

they make kydex in a TON of colors....paint wont adhere well

What we have is actually textured, so it might with the proper primer.

 

[jayp2]

What we have is actually textured, so it might with the proper primer.

let me know how it goes/takes

i'm afraid its going to be like painting teflon

 

[Land Shark]

let me know how it goes/takes

i'm afraid its going to be like painting teflon

Over the years I have painted kydex holsters quite a bit. Never got flaking. Sand then painted. It will eventually wear off though. Never used a primer. Maybe a primer for plastic stuff will give decent results. Definitely interested in the outcome.

 

[jayp2]

Over the years I have painted kydex holsters quite a bit. Never got flaking. Sand then painted. It will eventually wear off though. Never used a primer. Maybe a primer for plastic stuff will give decent results. Definitely interested in the outcome.

good to know

i know there are applications where they bond/glue fabric to kydex, its common with certain types of holsters

 

[kbahus]

I think you got shorted on that Pig...

I think you got shorted on that Pig...

what a beast!

I sure did get shorted, several inches lol.
There is going to be a ton of work involved and learning to get this piggy up to par, but I have nothing but time. It’s completely opposite from what I was hunting for, but sometimes you have to just go for it. I will eventually get a build thread going in the 55 section.

 

[bikersmurf]

I sure did get shorted, several inches lol.
There is going to be a ton of work involved and learning to get this piggy up to par, but I have nothing but time. It’s completely opposite from what I was hunting for, but sometimes you have to just go for it. I will eventually get a build thread going in the 55 section.

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I sure wouldn't complain if that followed me home. It's unfortunate that all the 55s I've seen up here have been badly rusted away. I know of a couple that went for next to nothing and were parted out because the body was too far gone.


I've considered stretching my 40 into a 43 so there'd be space for my son's chair and our dogs... if only there were more hours in the day to get things done. I wish I had the time, to use the skills I've learned working on it over the last 30+ years, to finish building it into something awesome. Actually, it is a 40... it's already awesome, but it could be even more awesome. I guess that's why it's a project that can always be improved upon and is never truly finished.

 

[Chuckha62]

I think you got shorted on that Pig...

He bought a piglet.

A wiener?

 

[trainbufftony]

Mmmm Piglets!

 

[CruiserTrash]

Over the years I have painted kydex holsters quite a bit. Never got flaking. Sand then painted. It will eventually wear off though. Never used a primer. Maybe a primer for plastic stuff will give decent results. Definitely interested in the outcome.

There's a company called XIM that only makes very application-specific primers. They don't make paint, they don't make sundries, just primers. I'm not sure if they would have an application for Kydex but they make some seriously bombproof plastic & glass primers I've used before. One of them is the only thing I've ever been able to successfully bond to Kynar (aka "vinyl") window frames, which is notoriously difficult to paint. Typically their stuff includes etching agents and chemical cross-linking agents, so it first dissolves a micro-layer on the substrate surface then the chemically becomes one with the material you're putting it on.

Experience: painting industry on and off for ~30 years, mainly 1) spraying oil enamel, urethane, varnish, lacquer, and 2) QA/warranty side of things working with paint company chemists.

But also you can just do ABS door cards and use SEM Color Coat plastic spray paint - maybe with an XIM primer as the base (or alone, which SEM says is fine). I don't know that the durability of Kydex is better than ABS for an application like that. You can get crazy and heat mold ABS as well, so Kydex doesn't necessarily have that advantage either.

Edit: There are a few other things you can do to get adherence/bonding on ABS that might work for Kydex. Sanding and wiping with solvent to open the surface pores up would probably be at the top of that list. I don't really know much about Kydex other than people form it into sidearms holsters.