The dash was already in place but it was not screwed in. I marked my holes for mounting the upper dash, removed the dash and drilled them out. Then put it back in and tested it. Both holes were about 1/4″ off. Took it out and redrilled. Much better. But my screws were not long enough. I went to Home Depot for longer screws. By now it was dark but I got those in. I put the lower dash in place and loosely bolted it to the upper dash. I should be able to get that screwed in tomorrow.
I got a little bit done over the weekend. Not much though. I’ve decided I have to get this done by the end of March. Well, actually the first week of April but if I say that then I’ll get it done the second week of April. We should be going to Vegas in early April, then California for the Knotts Berry Farm show later in April. I want to take this car for each trip.
My plan was to get the CF headliner installed and to get the dash bolted in.
I started by removing the steering wheel. This will make it much easier to get the dash and headliner in and out. I also removed some more trim. I thought I could get away with leaving it in but it’s better to be safe than sorry. I don’t want to scratch the headliner.
I managed to get the holes drilled for the visors and I trimmed out the opening for the third brake light. Since this headliner was clear coated and buffed the outline for the third brake light was not visible. I had previously cut out the opening but I didn’t cut it big enough. After wrestling with it to get it in place I took it out and trimmed it more. Then wrestled it back in only to find out I have to trim the edges for it to fit properly. I don’t have another headliner to use as a template so that will have to wait untill I can get to the junkyard.
Here’s a pic of the headliner after holes were drilled and third brake light was cut.
I finally got to work on the car a little yesterday. It has been raining a lot lately. If I wanted to live in Seattle I would have moved there.
I started putting in the headliner. I intended to finish, but I needed a small hole saw and was unable to proceed without it. I’ll get the hole saw later this week and finish it up. It should be a pretty easy install as long as all my holes line up right. I’ll take pictures and write up a post documenting the procedure when I’m done.
I was able to work on the hinges a little today. Unfortunately one of the hinge pins I got was missing the locking collar (or whatever it’s called) so I was only able to do one door. I took the door off this time. Normally that would be more hassle than it’s worth but the fender was only held in with two bolts so it was no problem.
The door doesn’t seem to sag anymore and has no problem closing. Unfortunately the outer door skin still doesn’t line up with the rear clip. I’m not sure why. I thought it was because the door was sagging but I took care of that. Hopefully I just need to adjust the outer door skin, but I’m not holding my breath. It looks like if I can actually adjust it enough to line up with the rear clip, then it will rub the front fender. This sort of crap always seems to happen to me. The rear clip seems to be lined up fine so I’m really not sure what to do now.
I haven’t done a damn thing on the car lately. I can’t do much untill I get the door hinges done and if you read my previous post you know how well that went last time I tried. I was going to attack the door hinges (probably literally) again today but I have a bad cold and didn’t feel up to it. We’ll see how I feel tomorrow.
