Carpet Fitting

Hi

First a warning, If there are any car trimmers reading this then please look away now as I wouldn't want you to lose your dinner.

Well its not that bad as I have really only just started and it probably will get worse.

And it started with a bit of a problem, as most long time Panther owners may know and as I have been learning over the last couple of years is that; No two Panthers are the same. Basically that's because they are hand built but also that they went through a number of design changes during their production lifetime. One of the design changes happened (I asked Terry B) around 1985 when the handbrake was moved two inches forward of the 1984 model, what's the problem you may ask, well a template for the tunnel carpet was taken from an 1984 Kallista and does not fit a 1986 Kallista.

So not much got done yesterday as I was trying to sort out the problem with Ray, the conclusion is that the tunnel carpet is being returned and Ray is very kindly making me a new one of the correct dimensions.

So if anyone is after a new carpet set then please ensure that the correct year is made.

Yesterday was not a whole loss as phil came round for an hour and the indicators where very quickly sorted and the hazard problem was also fixed.

Both front and back working very nicely, the problem was basically a wire mix up, just a matter of swapping them around and they worked. The hazards were just as simple as I had blown that fuse since last testing them, now that most things are wired up there should be no more problems of wires touching. Of course there are still electrical problems and Phil is coming round tonight to find out why I am getting residual current back through the driving lights, no problem just a crossed wire again.

So today was all carpet, Ray very kindly sent me a load of photos on the correct positioning of the pieces so I started with laying everything out in the car to have a look.

Lovely carpet.

I stripped everything out and thought the best place to start was behind the seats on the side panels.

This first panel is a little tricky as there are a number of angles to turn the carpet into.

The second piece goes under the seat belt angled upright and because there is trim on both edges I had to decide which would overlap the other.

I went for the angled being the overlapper and trimmed the first section to suit.

I had bought a roll of carpet tape to use instead of impact adhesive so when I was happy with the fit I covered the area with the tape.

Then carefully stuck the carpet into position.

The vinyl turns around the door frame and the door trim will cover, I shall wait until it is all well stuck before cutting the excess from around the door edge. I could see a bit of a problem in the future and that is fitting the bolt for the hood even though the flap is there to access the bolts it will still be difficult, maybe its to high.

The next piece to get cut was the angled overlap, I don't know why the Panther design is for the trim edging to come only half way down.

So I have cut the stitching on the piece I trimmed of the first section and spent 10 minutes when finished to sew it onto the edge.

Not machine sewn but its behind the seats and no one will ever know.

I shall stick the angled side into position and buy some velcro for the edge as I need to access this area for the seat belt attachment.

Next was the inner footwell section, this piece just needed trimming to size and sticking on as there is no edging to worry about.

The underlay I fitted was a little close to the edge of the door where the vinyl needs to fold and the door trim fitted so I trimmed off the excess all of the way around. I also remembered the wire for the door light and fed that through before sticking the carpet on.

I test fit the sections.

The upright section would be the first to fit as the bottom section has the trim on both edges.

I first had to do a bit of fitting and trimming.

I made a bit of a mess of one of the corner joins but that will be hidden by the trim.

After I had double checked everything I fit the tape.

Then stuck on the first section 

The bottom section went on next.

I found the rubber trim and realised its the same trim used for the windscreen edge so I have been on eBay and ordered another 4m, not much point in using the old stuff with a nice new carpet, so I shall leave the trimming of the edges until that arrives on Saturday or Monday.

Well thats one side mostly complete and I shall attempt the drivers side tomorrow hopefully learning from the mistakes made on this side.

Just have to wait for Phil now and hopefully some good news with the drivers lights.

see ya Paul

Underlay & Gaiter

Hi

Been busy these last two days on the underlay, never realised how much of a job it was to re-lay a car. Each piece was measured up and cut to pattern then stuck down with impact adhesive, I started out with the tin of solvent free but after running out I ended up buying a tin of solvent Evostick, never realised how expensive this stuff was £14 for 500ml wow. Still it finished the job.

The first days got me up to the seating area, really difficult to cut the jute as it is interwoven with polyester strings which I imagine is to give it extra strength but it quickly blunts the blades and I ended up using a scalpel.

Got started today determined to finish it until I realised I hadn't bought sufficient to do the job, guess 2sq m just ain't enough.

I had enough to finish all of the seating area and fully under the dash, luckily for me I knew a man who has a lot of rolls stored above his paint booth so I shot off the see Ant at Paint Right who did my respray and he was quite happy to let me have some.

So I have finished all of the back area and up the sides of the doors, can't remember if the top of the fuel tank area was covered, but easy enough to put some on when I get there with the carpet.

I have been cutting holes in the underlay for the carpet studs to be reattached to the carpet and riveting back those that the rivets had rotted through and had pulled out with the old carpet, I have also bought a 25m roll of double sided carpet tape to stick it in the places where there are no studs.

I was also wondering what to do with the gear stick gaiter as the old one was just the rubber and seeing how I have a nice new matching vinyl gaiter from Ray I thought I had better spruce it up a bit so I had a little search on ebay and came up with a beauty.

It is from a MGB with a chrome outer bezel and a new rubber gaiter.

The vinyl gaiter will need cutting to size but hopefully it will fit under the chrome bezel.

I knew that the centre console is very close to the gearstick and I was a little unsure of whether or not it would fit when I ordered it, I has 130mm to play with from the centre of the gearstick to where the center console ends and luckily for me it just fits other wise it would have been £20 down the drain.

I had to turn the bezel 90 degrees to where it should sit as it is longer than wider but it fits nicely.

To fit it I put the stick in the neutral position and cut around the rubber removing the underlay.

I then refit the rubber and drilled and tapped the holes to 6 mil, unfortunately being from an MGB the stainless screws supplied are 1/4" BSF and I didn't have a tap to suit so after a search I have found 3 stainless bolts and the fourth may turn up or I shall buy some. 

I have screwed it down and tomorrow I shall fit the carpet and make the same cutout as I did in the underlay and hopefully the rubber will seal the carpet from the weather.

Tomorrow should be the start of fitting everything back together and Phil the electrician is coming late afternoon so hopefully some other things will be working as they should.

see ya Paul

Heater & Underlay

Hi

Didn't think I would get much done today with it being a Sunday, but my parents are on holiday and Lynne has taken to her bed with flu symptoms so back to work.

First job was to drag the heater unit out of storage and try to figure out how to re-fit it, first problem was to find all of the bits and after searching for half an hour I found the lost piece was still attached to the car, such fun.

You can see in the photo the cowl fitted to the top of the heater, I could not fit this originally as I had re-built the fan unit the wrong way around when I refurbished it and the wires were facing the wrong way for the cowl cutout. I stripped it down and re-positioned it in the correct position, I also took the opportunity to test it again and it worked great. I then screwed  the cowl into position, there was a bit of a gap around the edges so I siliconed these up. 

The bottom of the housing sits on the tunnel and positioned by a bracket.

This was originally riveted on so I tapped the holes to 6mm and bolted it in position.

The 2 brackets you can see on the fan housing clip over 2 studs on a chassis crossmember, the cowl fits through the cutout in the scuttle and the plastic cover is siliconed over the protruding cowl section.

You can see the fan in position when I test fit it, once I fit the carpet I can then get it bolted on tight.

I had another search on the internet this morning for the veneer softener recipe, the one I found uses

2 parts wood glue

3 parts water

1 part glycerine

1 part denatured alcohol

I was a bit unsure where I could find the alcohol and found the answer on the internet and in the bathroom cabinet, one of its uses is as nail varnish remover.

I marked of a small spray bottle into segments and measured out each ingredient and gave it a test.

I used a bit of the scarp red maple, this is quite stiff being a burl and doesn't want to bend too easily.

This was the max I could get it to go, I gave it a good spray both sides and after a few hours I gave it another test.

I shall give it another test in the morning and I may be lucky.

The main job I wanted to get started on today was the underlay, I bought a roll of jute around 2m square quite a while ago and it has just been sitting in the loft.

This was the material that I removed from the car and the decision to reuse this basically came down to price, there are a lot more modern underlays / soundproofers on the market but it would have run into a couple of hundred to do the whole car whereas the jute was around £70 for the roll. It does have the problem of smelling a bit when wet, so I hopefully won't get it wet.

I started with the centre section, I measured up and marked it out on the roll.

Unfortunately the width was a few inches short but no problem I can fit a little piece in place.

I made the cuts for all of the sticky out bits and test fit.

I also fit a couple of screws to locate the centre console attachment holes.

Next came a couple of side sections, I shall be doing the sides in 3 parts to save on waste and the first section where cut and glued into position along with the centre section.

Well not much done today but more than I thought, I have a service in the Merc tomorrow so will get started again when I return.

see Ya Paul

Dash and Electrics

Hi

Home again, actually got home last Thursday evening after my first trip working on the wind farms and boy are those babies big, anyway I had a few days working on the car then off on holiday. Had a nice time in the Lake district at Bowness on Lake Windermere and stopped at a lovely country hotel called Fayrer Garden House Hotel, bit of a mouthful but very nice and great food.

Shame it rained most days but that was made up for when Lynne got bit by a goose while feeding them, she didn't half scream and I'm still laughing now. Lovely bruise.

I have spent my time working on the electrics, I finished the wiring to the box that I was working on before I went away. I have logged each wire where it goes and what it does in the log book for future reference and have colour coded each wire with shrink wrap to make identification easy.

May look a bit of a mess but its quite well worked out, the headlights for both looms are the top wires, the middle wires are for the side indicators and the bottom set of wires are for the sidelights and front indicators. The looms are tucked away out of sight and tie wrapped so the only part you see are the wires leading into the box. 

All of the side lights work.

The dipped headlights and the main beams all work as they should.

But I still have a problem with the indicators, the drivers side works well but not the pass side so I still have a bit of figuring out to do there. I have solved one problem and that was the issue of the fuse blowing every time I tried the passenger side indicators, this problem went away when I wired up the rear lighting. The rear lighting was relatively simple and I just used bullet connectors for this. the wiring diagram came in very handy and I had them all wired up in a couple of hours. The rear drivers indicator works well but the same problem occurs with the passenger side rear indicator, hopefully my electrician will be able to figure something out. 

One of the things I have tried was fitting the dash and plugging in the main wiring loom.

My thought was that maybe the circuit would not be complete without the dash flasher repeater being in the circuit but no joy there either, in fact it created more work as after a couple of flashes the new indicator repeater packed in. It was quite expensive at around £10 but after a test with my power tester then the meter on it I pronounced it dead, the led must have blown. 

I had spent quite enough on the new warning light display so I thought no more, out with the old indicator block and see what I could do with it. I decided to use the whole of the front section of the display as originaly most of it is hidden behind the dash and you only see the warning lights, so first job was to separate the bracket section.

I sanded everything smooth and rounded the corners before giving it a couple of coats of satin black.

I removed the new/old display, marked of the hole and cut out the oblong section.

Test run before spraying.

A bit of auto tape on the back and it looked like the original.

I noticed a small problem when I had the dash plugged in and that was that I had wired up the new volt meter gauge to the clock power supply, not the best idea as the clock has permanent power so that had to change.

I wired up the voltmeter, all of the warning lights and worked out the wiring for the new underside light so it can work from the new door switches. After tiding up all of the wiring it looked quite neat.

So hopefully; the dash is truly finished, apart from the radio.

I also had a bit of a problem with one of the pistons on the drivers side caliper, I had overhauled these over a year ago and one of them has started to leak. I had noticed this before I went on holiday so I ordered a new set of seals and stripped it down. There are 2 pistons per caliper and only one was leaking, I have noticed some very fine scratches on the piston and they were in a pretty bad state when I removed them so hopefully this second set of new seals will do the job, if not then its a new piston, if I can find one separate from a set of four.

Another job was the wheel caps. 

Mine where in a very bad condition, I probably could have restored them but I decided on a new set, not quite as simple as just buying a new set as they are not made anymore. 

Fortunately Bruno sells a set of caps and Val at the club sells a set of stick on logos.

As you can see, mine are a little worse for wear. 

Now that you have the new caps your troubles are still not over as the rear set requires a little modification, not a lot, just a little sanding.

The front set fits nicely into the hole although they are a little slack and could be easily removed or lost while driving so I removed the wheels and hot glued them in from behind.

The rear wheel have drum brakes and so have less room to fit the caps in place.

When fitted like this they do not sit fully in place.

But a sheet of sandpaper and 5 minutes work will take of the required amount.

These will still need a little glueing from behind but the fit is a lot better.

The caps also have a dip in the middle which does not allow the logos to fully stick apart from around the edges, a bit of hot glue in the middle solved this.

Another job I have finished is the gear stick surround, this is the section that the rubber gaiter is fitted to, I had damaged the original on removal so I made a new one in stainless.

I have siliconed the underside to prevent any water getting through and onto the carpet.

While away I ordered some sample sets of edge trimming seal for the door windscreen interface, I got samples from 3 different companies and compared them all.

Quite a few to choose from, an the nearest match was from a company called Monkeydub car parts on ebay, I bought a metre of their Medium 2 car door rubber .

Another purchase was some more veneer for the door caps, unfortunately now it has arrived I realise I didn't order enough so will have to get some more. I stuck with the Maple wood but could not find any red burl maple of sufficient length so I have gone for Birds Eye maple, it is much lighter than the red but once the lacquer is on the color will darken out and the birds eyes will come through nicely.

The main problem I have is getting it to bend around the tight curves of the cappings, I have searched the web and come up with a recipe for homemade veneer softener. This is a mixture of Glycerine, water, PVA glue and denatured alcohol, still haven't figured out what this is, I read in one place it is surgical spirit in another it was methylated spirits??? anyone know.

Whatever I shall try both, I have already bought the glycerine.

Now for the good news and what I have been waiting for to progress the final stage.

My interior has arrived and it looks fantastic.

I bought it all through Ray at R.S Sewing Solutions  and boy is he good, I was a little unsure of the door card design so Ray gave me a hand and I give him my thanks as its better than I could have come up with.

Both the Black Panther and the wing logo have been embroidered into the vinyl, he has also fitted all of the buttons in the back so I just need to push on the door and job done.

The wool carpet is matching with cream piping.

This is only part of it, he also throws in a free gear stick cover and the handbrake cover is sewn into the carpet.

The sunvisors have matching vinyl.

Unfortunately the chrome section of the sunvisors are not in the best of condition so I may be looking at new one's.

The mohair looks fantastic, I haven't opened the hood yet but the spare wheel cover is great, I had the wing logo embroidered in this as well.

I have gone for the black hood with beige interior and with any luck I may get it fitted this time home as I have around 2 1/2 weeks left but no rush, the main job is cutting and fitting the underlay and carpet for the centre section then I can fit the heater, dash and center console. So to progress the job I have removed the bonnet and scuttle for access, maybe get a bit more done tomorrow.

See ya Paul