Here's a pic of the misc body parts I picked up:
The doors need paint, but thats okay since the whole car is getting painted. Whats important is that they're rust free, the windows are in good shape and the window tracks are straight. My driver's side door has rust around the broken door handle, and the pass side door's window is all fucked up. I also picked up a 2nd targa top, since mine has a few cracks in it.. figured why not. I might chop up the worst out of the two and make a sunroof targa, since there is no structural bracing that runs through the center of it.
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Vinyl: Yesterday I went up to Tukwila to an upholstery wholesaler to find some vinyl to closest match my 'shadow gray' interior. The place i went to carried all the OEM fabrics for Ford, GM, Nissan, Toyota, VW, and a few others.. but being as Toyota hasn't had a car with Shadow Gray in some time, I found two close matches: Toyota Charcoal, and Toyota Dark Charcoal. Both were close and passable, but I think the dark charcoal was a tad closer, and I liked the darker version a bit better
I also got a few yards of some Carbon Fiber textured vinyl. Its soft, pliable, stretches a little, and reflects light in a neat manner. AND, its a fuckload cheaper than real CF. Upclose it doesn't look the same, but I'm not trying to pretend its real. Its just another accenting fabric that has a neat texture. It will be used for accent pieces.
So, with lots of yards of gray, and several of CF, I came back home.
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Stereo: Last night I redid the wiring harness running from the receiver back to the amps. Its nearly 3/4" thick! In it are:
4x 14ga mid power wires
4x 18ga tweeter power wires
Tsunami 6ch shielded RCAs
RJ45 Gain control
14ga amp remote on
Previously, I had the component speaker crossovers mounted in the doors.. but they were never secured with anything. And, theres not a whole lot of room under the dash, so I decided to relocate them to the trunk with the rest of the audio equipment. This is also futureproofing the system, so when I change out the components, i won't have to take off the doors.
Then I got to work on the center console/bezel thing. Previously, I had planned to mount a 7" touchscreen there and run a carputer, but the screen was pointless in daylight, it needed a fair amount of shade. And, it was just a bit clumsy. so, I ditched that idea (now using the touchscreen as a 2nd monitor on my pc dedicated to controlling media
) and went for a simpler single DIN cd reciever. This required a new frame for the big chunk i had cut out of the bezel to be securely fiberglassed into the console. The stuff I used is called Kitty Hair. Its "long strand fiberglass body filler" - fantastic for doing this sort of stuff.
Behind this wood frame is another piece of MDF that'll actually be the mounting point for the Receiver. I could have made it flush, but then the deck would have stuck out like a sore thumb, so this way, its recessed a bit and sits almost flush with the rest of the piece:
Once everything was trimmed, and sanded smooth, I went to go paint the recessed piece black, but then when I put it next to the CF vinyl, which I'll be covering the rest of the bezel with, It didn't look quite right (and I didn't feel like doing MORE sanding to getting it to a smoothness I could lay down some proper paint on). So, I wrapped it in the CF vinyl. The edges are gross, and thats okay since you won't see anything but the center area of this peice.
As you can see, the main bezel still has some more sanding to get straight, a little bit of body filler to ease the gaps, and then i'll get covered in CF too. In the extra space below the receiver will be switches. I have to wait for the rest of them to come in before I can drill holes and get them mounted to their plate.
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Trunk: The trunk carpet in my car is appalling. Its horrifically disgusting. Falling part, stinky. just gross. Well, Its going to get wrapped in vinyl as well (once the sub box and amp racks get made), and thus, new floor vinyl in place of that old worn out carpet. One thing thats always annoyed me though is theres that extra little empty space at the very corners of the trunk, that because the false floor has to open, it can't fully fill those spots. i'm not sure if the cars originally came with a piece there or not, mine certainly didn't, so I made some.
I don't want to see this:
Thats more like it!
I still have to make the bracket/stand things that'll keep them in place, but at least the whole trunk will be even now. And no, I'm not getting rid of the false floor (though it will be modified a little bit) - I'm keeping the spare!
