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NAILS!!!

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Nunyas

Nunyas

Yoda
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Of all the DPO things I've found on my B so far, NAILS has to be the one to take the cake. I spent all morning Saturday stripping out the interior so I can lay in sound deadening, new carpet, and rebuild my seats. After I pulled the old carpet and floor mats out, I proceeded to vacuum the floor boards. At which point, I found that I kept snagging something in the floor board. When I bent over to look at what it was, I found that one of the previous owners of my B had NAILED the carpet into the foot wells on both the driver and passenger sides! NAILED!!! /bcforum/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/rolleyes.gif

Well, at least the new stuff is being put in correctly. 4 snaps for each of the foot well floor carpets, 5 snaps for the package shelf piece, and all the other pieces gets glued in.

Also, 40spft of "Damplifier" ( from https://www.secondskinaudio.com ) was enough to do the interior of my car. I didn't get 100% coverage on all surfaces, but I did get 100% on the floor boards (hottest areas), and 75 to 80% coverage on all the remaining surfaces. I have 1 sheet left to apply at this point, and it is going to go on the rear bulkhead.

Sunday, I plan to finish putting the driver's seat back together, rebuild the passenger seat, and install padding on the firewall, transmission tunnel, and rear bulk head. Oh yeah, and finish gluing in the remaining carpet pieces.

I'll post some pics Sunday night.
 
oh yeah, I want to add this in case any of you is thinking about adding sound deadening to your car, DO NOT do it in direct sun light. Let me say that again, DO NOT apply this stuff in direct sun light.

It has nothing to do with sunlight/heat affecting the material. Instead, it has to do with what highly reflective materials can do to your eye sight. I found out the hard way. I was being blinded by sunlight from above and below! And then the heat from the reflected light started baking me! By the time I decided that I should be working in the shade, I felt like an ant under a magnifying glass. :no: Some of us learn the hard way... Apparently, I'm one of us. heh
 
Rob, I tore out the last of the carpet in the GT last night, and have not yet got a plan for this kind of stuff.
Let us know how it goes and what sound improvements are made.
My local auto upholstery shop will do the carpet ($200 installed!), but they don't do this stuff.
Look forward to the pics.
PS Sorry about the nails! /bcforum/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/hammer.gif
 
Does this keep heat out of the cockpit as well? I had the GT out yesterday and man it hot in there.
 
good luck on the seat rebuild. As soon as my B comes back from the paint shop, I plan to do the seats too, any help or suggestions you may have would be greatly appreciated. Moss does not supply any instructions with the interior kit.
I am looking forward to your pics.
 
Another example of the lack of respect our cars were treated to as they aged. The nailer must have thought it was an MGA. /bcforum/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/jester.gif sheesh.
 
Ok, this was probably the lengthiest project I've done so far. Took me the entire weekend start to finish. I'll start with pics of the seat covers.

Seat Bottom:
seatbottomxi4.jpg


Headrest cover:
dsc00090gp3.jpg


Seat Back:
seatbacknq2.jpg


Transforms this seat:
beforeseathm2.jpg


Into this seat (much more presentable!):
afterseatnp9.jpg


Here's the sound deadening/heat insulation installed:
foillayedph5.jpg


The back - the rear bulkhaed has the sound deadener applied to it (the silver stuff peaking out under the trim panel) and the trim panel as the thick padding glued to it, like you see on the two side trim pieces:
backjq4.jpg


And the carpeting/insulating is done:
carpetinxv5.jpg


driverfeeten1.jpg


backdonetr2.jpg
 
Now for the differences that I've noticed so far.

First, my car had a resonance that the exhaust system would hit around 3500 RPM and would just made the exhaust sound like a really loud drone while inside the car. That effect is now gone. The body tub doesn't resonate and drone with the exhaust anymore. Now, I hear the exhaust the way other people hear it. It's sound reaches me through the air, not through the chassis anymore.

As for the heat, I can't say yet. I haven't had a chance to take it out for a good run to test that. But according to Stewart (he used the same stuff I did), the heat on your feet is significantly reduced.

What I did in my installation may have been slightly different from what Stewart did. I laid "Damplifier" on the floor boards, and then I glued felt padding (about 1/2" thick with a foil backing) to the backs of all the carpet pieces in the foot wells, then I glued the pieces to the firewall and transmission tunnel. I also glued padding to the backside of the carpet on the floor boards and to the main tranny tunnel carpet.

The driver's feet are above the catalytic converter in my car. My feet tend to get hot on my commute to and from work. So, I should be able to gauge how well this stuff works heat wise tomorrow.

I rebuilt the seats while I had the interior apart. The old seat foam was tired, and the webbing was non-existent. The seat bottoms were pretty easy to replace. The seat bottom webbing required the use of vice grips to put in place.

The seat back was a bit tricky. I would recommend letting new vinyl warm up in the sun to become more pliable before trying to slide it over new seat foam. The method I used was to position the seat back foam in the frame then slide the back cover over it.

One thing I noticed about my seats is that I'm sitting a LOT higher in the car now. I'm looking through the top 6" of the screen most of the time. I don't think I like sitting this high in my car. Anyone know about how long it takes for the foam and webbing to break in?
 
Twenty years or so should do it. /bcforum/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/devilgrin.gif
 
Nicely done! You've really come a long way on that car.

The seat foam doesn't compress very fast. If you want to sit lower, take the seat apart and slice the bottom 1/2 inch off the padding.
 
Looks like a super job from here.
 
I'm going to have to remake those side trim pieces (front and rear) some time this summer. As ya'll can see from the photos, they're showing their age. What's the material you used for yours doc? formica?
 
NOPE!!! A plastic I got from a bud with a sign shop: "Sheffield Plastics MAKROLON" polycarbonate. Measures 0.112+", I'd call it 3/32". Water immune, non-shattering. Easily cut with a Skill-saw and "plastic" blade.
File the edges and drill the holes before covering. /bcforum/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/thumbsup.gif
 
<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:]Of all the DPO things I've found on my B so far, NAILS has to be the one to take the cake. [/QUOTE]

My DPO manual says that Nails are wrong: proper carpet tacks should be used..... /bcforum/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/devilgrin.gif /bcforum/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/jester.gif
 
heh... whoever nailed the carpet into my car spared no expense in doing so. No penny nails there. They used what I think people like to call 'lock nails'(?). You know, it kinda resembles a screw with a nail head on top.

Anyways, now that I've had a chance to drive to work and back, I gotta say the heat on me feet is WAY more tolerable. No more getting out of the car with hot foot! /bcforum/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/laugh.gif
 
Nunyas said:
When I bent over to look at what it was, I found that one of the previous owners of my B had NAILED the carpet into the foot wells on both the driver and passenger sides! NAILED!!! /bcforum/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/rolleyes.gif
Click to expand...

The PO must have been hammered when he installed that carpeting!

/bcforum/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/smile.gif
 
Someone should of warned ya about the rebuilt seat effect but at least your head didn't end up above the windshield. Forget about the seats breaking in anytime soon. The covers look fantastic and if you didn't point them out as covers you would never know.
 
side bennie of those covers.... they have pouches in the back! yay! more storage space! /bcforum/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/laugh.gif


Sooooo... standard hand saw to cut the foam down 0.5 - 1.0 inches?
 
At th' BOTTOMS!!!

..or alternately you could just cut the straps from under th' foam... /bcforum/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/devilgrin.gif
 
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