When it rains ... we ....

[Rastaforte]

Sew.

So it rained this past weekend and with clay and mud flowing like lava, we decided to switch gears and tackle something indoors.... preferably

something with tactile feel, soft and pliable and something worthy of the nimbleness of our fingers...

<<<SCREEEECH>>>

No. No. No. That won't do.

Okay, really...
We decided to all head to Mike's downtown Sac clothing shop and utilize his exquisite skills with thread & material while Bill and I made short work of our leather cutting-pattern making neolithic wanna-be skills to ....
make custom leather covers for the rigs.

Bill and Mike had top/side and bottom pieces to re-cover for their FJ40's----

Black super-pimp leather with Bugatti style double red cross-stitched seams. For RastaRig, I chose the more subdued black Elk skin leather with matching black seam stitching. I had pondered the acid-washed supple cow hides...in orange and browns looking for a look befitting of the RastaRig's name.....but zebra showed.

We talked Mike out of the beaver pelt and dove into our work as rain pelted the ancient downtown Sac building next to the Masonic Temple....

 

[Rastaforte]

Man, Man, Man, Manly Men Sew....

Finding the right leather....



Taking the FJ40 dash pieces and creating patterns ... cutting....

 

[Rastaforte]

Man, Man, Man, Manly Men Sew....

More tracing/leather cutting for the FJ40 dash pieces...





Some sewing happens off camera.... with the top/bottom section of long piece attached with needle, thread and some Juki magic...

 

[Rastaforte]

Man, Man, Man, Manly Men Sew....

Looking good...coming along....
pieces here for FJ40 top dash piece have been placed over dash and stretching and forming carefully performed....

 

[Rastaforte]

Man, Man, Man, Manly Men Sew....

Piece before glue applied and final fit-up to see if all section/sewing done right.....



Glue is applied and work like a Bear to re-fit, place and stretch so leather cover follows all contours of original 40 dash piece....



lookin' not bad. not bad.....

 

[Rastaforte]

Man, Man, Man, Manly Men Sew....

More details for Fj40 final glue phase on top piece....



Some nice views of the final stitch work on end pieces....

 

[Rastaforte]

Man, Man, Man, Manly Men Sew....

Final look of the Fj40 top dash piece...





Onward and upward... the Fj60 dash
First lame pattern for dash cluster area....

 

[Rastaforte]

Man, Man, Man, Manly Men Sew....

I always wondered what Mom was doing with all that paper cutting and needles stuck to hold the fabric...and my fingers....

Here I'm starting out what ends up being 3 hours of iterative paper cutting, drawing, estimating as I try to nail the patterns and get the seems just right. By the time I'm done and happy with the end result, I have a mound of large paper about two feet high....

Alot of work behind the final patterns. For the FJ60 and the FJ40.. .but honestly, it's kind of fun....

 

[Rastaforte]

Man, Man, Man, Manly Men Sew....

Final pattern for elk leather --- instrument cluster portion here

 

[Rastaforte]

Man, Man, Man, Manly Men Sew....

Now the leather cutting begins and once done, we head to the Juki for some double-stitching and a couple of nicely placed top stitches

 

[Rastaforte]

Man, Man, Man, Manly Men Sew....

It's not the prettiest dash but it's a donor and will look better than the brown I've switched over from... to the grey. Now the black Elk will be interesting... note speaker holes, I'm going to cover those out barbarically to prevent show-through later....



Speaker holes covered...



I'll have more pics later but here is the end detail before leather glued and stretched on...yeah, the ends are shot but I'll easily reinforce later from inside, re-attach the vents and you'll never know....

 

[Rastaforte]

Man, Man, Man, Manly Men Sew....

Nice detail after stretching the Elk over the dash left side....note the separate end piece next to the leftmost vent piece and finally stitching up with the cluster center piece....

Stitching turned out super fine care of Mike's nimble Juki work...



View of opposite end prior to leather going on....




And after...

 

[Rastaforte]

Man, Man, Man, Manly Men Sew....

Some back views.... of the Fj60 dash. I've still got alot of little work to cut out openings and final glue those as well as smooth out corners...

 

[hedonist]

sweet
dig it!

 

[greentruck]

8itching Stitching!

I'm waiting for a little more warmth to engage in a sewing project, too. We have a DAC tail gate tent that we use attached to our 80. It doesn't quite fit the 80 and we have a fridge on a slide to free up all the space inside except the front seats to sleep that needs a little more room when it's back on the tailgate.

To make it fit better, I need to sew a "floor" into the tail gate part of the DAC. It's a simpler project, but the first time I've ever sewed something with more than a needle and thread to get a button back on.

Your pics help me imagine myself doing what I need to do. Glad the cheap nylon for my project isn't leather, though
I did make a straight stitch when I dug out and tested the sewing machine this winter as prep. Maybe there's hope

And you're going to have a a nice looking dash on your 40
I like that red and black combination.

 

[Rastaforte]

Few more pics showing the more of the pieces I didn't get a chance to put up ...
and how they look in both rigs:

These are some views of Cumminscruiser FJ40:

 

[Rastaforte]

 

[Rastaforte]

This is Mike's FJ40 showing some views of the dash installed - ignore the wires regurgitating out from the openings .....

 

[Rastaforte]

Mikes 40:

 

[GAS-A-LOT!]

wow, I want to cry.... That all looks awesome... Where is the final 60 dash pic?