August 2007 Interior Trim
With Ministry of Transport tests completed the car is now 'road legal', hooray! There is however still work to be done - the brakes and steering do not inspire confidence. These problems need to be fixed before travelling very far, or fast, more on that later. Meanwhile on to the interior trimming - rather than giving a detailed description of this longish process there are pictures in the gallery and some comments here on things I learned along the way.
Dynamat was used extensively, without it the tub booms like a drum. It works best when it is fully in contact with the panels, a wallpaper roller helps out here - don't be tempted to use your hands as the foil edges are like scalpels. It made a remarkable improvement to the doors, particularly when applied to the base panel.
There were 2 types of foam backing included in the trim kit from Aldridge, an open cell type on the left and a closed cell version (similar to a surfers wet suit) on the right. Care has to be taken with the open cell variety, any pressure on it once the adhesive is applied results in a permanent dent. I found that brush applied adhesive was more easily controlled but the aerosol type gives a more uniform application providing surrounding areas can be masked off.
The wiring harness was stuck into the corners with contact adhesive so the rear wheel arch Moquette could be fixed.
The Hardura as supplied fitted exactly, all that was necessary was to ensure that the cut-out for the boot release cable lined up with the hole in the bulkhead. If I were to do this again I would use some backing as otherwise the Hardura follows the corrugations of the bulkhead. Now is a good time to locate the holes for the seatbelt fixings and the lift-the-dot fastners.
The chrome finisher for the door sill is a tight fit so the closed cell foam was trimmed short of the edge.
The centre console was difficult, in theory the aluminium and its plywood base just glue onto the metalwork. In practice I had to bolt it on.
The Heritage Certificate showed the original trim colour as "Dark Blue piped Light Blue", perhaps it was to special order but it's a nice combination although it doesn't look as good here under fluorescent lighting.
Trimming of the seats and the dash top were beyond my capabilities and as they are perhaps the most visible items I entrusted them to Aldridge. For the rest, well as it was my first attempt I'm fairly happy with the end result.
It has been pointed out that the ashtray panel is inverted. I plan to fix this but for now it is the only way I can get the centre dash to drop down.