The road to Phoenix (Updated 5.15.09 - Massive Brake work)

[H_Krix]

Awesome work man. I'm envious on many levels.

Thanks dude. I'm really looking forward to getting back to the states and finishing this thing up. I've been out of the country most of August and feel like a slacker for not getting anything done...

[oz_tom]

Any movement mate? Please tell me that sweet as console is all covered now!

[H_Krix]

Any movement mate? Please tell me that sweet as console is all covered now!

Just got back in the states last Friday, I'll be wrenching on the car this weekend and hopefully making some headway. I lost a lot of time in August being gone for near 3 weeks.

Anniversary is this weekend as well, so I might be short on time until next week too... BAH!

[Todd21]

H,

Did you ever get around to creating patterns for the trunk side panels? I'd like to have something to go by.

Todd

[H_Krix]

H,

Did you ever get around to creating patterns for the trunk side panels? I'd like to have something to go by.

Todd

Not yet. I've since learned that the side boards were only included on round-light cars, as the side supports made mounting these in square-light cars something of a pain in the ass. I can fit the factory boards in my car by bending the nonsense out of them, but the thicker material I used to cut copies won't work unless it gets severely shaved down. I'm currently looking for an alternative to this...

Its been a while since I posted anything. I've been very busy with the rest of things going on in my life, so unfortunately Phoenix has taken a backseat for the past month and a half or so. A trip to China along with a few conventions really took up my schedule, along with a newfound affinity for propmaking. I should really finish one project before starting on others, but alas...

Things I have completed:

Carpet is installed, after sitting around for nearly three years in its boxes. The blue looks great, and I'd really love to put the doorpanels in as well,but they aren't finished yet. Ditto for the center console, but hopefully that will get wrapped up this week. Along with this went the passenger-side seatbelt assembly, but I had to stop there as I can't find any more of the fine-threaded bolts to mount the rest of the belts in with...

Kickpanels are installed (much props to Bill Williams on these pieces) They're a little shallow for the speakers I want to use, so I may have to add some spacers. On that note...

Speakers are wired in, with crossovers mounted. Tweeters have been rewired in the dash and everything there is set to go once I cut the carpet in the kicks for the speakers and mount them up.

Sunroof seals are in and the glue should be dry by now. I should be able to install the rails and cables in next week, and hopefully I won't scratch the ever-loving piss out of the roof like the last time I tried this.

Trim is being polished. I balked at the price of new stuff - $160 a side for quarter window lower trim and nearly twice that for upper door trim. Granted I'll have to come up with some sort of replacement for the felt liner and squeegee on these parts, but I'm betting I can come up with some sort of replacement. So far the polishing is turning out great. I'm going with 400, 600, 1000, 2000, and Mother's aluminum polish after that.

Hopefully this weekend I can get the gas pedal mounted up, bleed the clutch, finish the last piece of carpet, and maybe start on either the quarter window glass / door seals / sunroof. Need to start making progress again!

I'll have pics of some of this stuff up soon.

[H_Krix]

Got the console all wrapped up yesterday... finally. Turned out GREAT. I couldn't be happier with the result. Ignore the gauges, they're just placeholders for now until I order the correct ones. Oh, and those white streaks on the side are just the light, not a bunch of dust like it appears.

Sunroof seals going in and a quick test fit. All the aluminum bits have been polished up, just need to rewrap the headliner insert before this goes back together.

Window and door seals installed. The quarter window trim polished up really well.

[carrosene]

I love the console. I need to swing by one day and check out your car and be like wow my car sucks. Hahaha.

Eric

[justinevert]

Hey HKrix,

Wow!! Awesome work (again) who did the stiching on the console?

On the sun rood mechanisms, did you polish them the same manner as the trim?

More pics, more pics ,more pics!!!!

Again great work.

Justin

[H_Krix]

My girlfriend did the stitchwork on the console, but I outlined & cut out all the patterns. Took a couple tries to get the fit just right, as the first one I made was way too snug.

The sunroof trim and window trim have been polished in the same way - 400, 600, 1000, 2000 grit, then Mother's aluminum polish. I realize this means I'll have to hand polish the trim rather often, but the price of new trim is just too restrictive and clearcoating the aluminum seems like something that will yellow with time.

More pics to come soon, I just haven't been able to get out to my garage (its about 25 miles away from my house) recently due to the gasoline shortages here in Atlanta.

[H_Krix]

Thank GOD for this forum. Seriously, I went to do my windshields and hood this past weekend, 2 projects I have absolutely NO experience with whatsoever, and they both went near perfectly.

I started out by pulling all of the glass that wasn't in the car already (which amounted to both windshields and both pieces of rear quarter glass) and following Henry Hsu's article for glass restoration. I only deviated from this in a couple of respects - I actually used a medium weight rubbing compound around the edges and on some of the heavier scratches. My glass is still far from "perfect" or "new" but its MILES better than this car has seen in its lifetime.

Example of what I started out with - water spots, paint overspray, hazing, dusty and stained:

And a compare/contrast finished product and fresh-from-the-parts bin:

The front and rear glass looked pretty similar before I started working on those. Major props (again) to my friend Joe who helped with the polishing and installation of the glass. Aside from the (god damn piece of shite little bastard) lockstrip, everything went in amazingly easily.

I used the "nylon rope" method spoken about a ton of times when people do their glass:

Taped the rope to the glass (another trick I read about here) to keep it out of the way during install:

Having someone apply pressure from the outside while you pull from the inside is key, especially in the corners. I wish I could have seen it from the outside - Joe and my sister (who was taking the really shaky pics here) said it looked like the gasket was getting "sucked into" the car. I guess thats what we're going for, right? For the rear glass, I started the rope at the bottom and worked up to the top - bottom first, then both corners (one at a time), then both top corners, the both sides to the middle. I tried to keep things as symmetrical as possible because... well... it makes sense I suppose.

Finished product! (lockstrip is there, its a black Turbo one)

The front followed the same direction, but I found that (after a first failed attempt) the rope works better pulling from the top down to the base. I don't know if it just wasn't seated properly the first time but the upper corners wouldn't pull in when we tried the rope at the base on try #1. Not many pics of this, my "photographer" has left to get pizza.

(ignore the rope placement here, we moved it to the top after this shot was taken)

Finished product!

You may notice something in the above shot that wasn't there before: a hood. On a high from getting all that glass in, Joe and I decided to toss the hood on while we were at it for good measure. Getting the bolts threaded up with only 2 people was a bit of a pain, but everything lined up well and we had it on there in under 10 minutes. It still needs a lot of adjustment, but that will come this weekend.

Time to whore out some pics: Phoenix looks like a real car!

Next weekend: hood adjustment, center console wiring, quarter glass install (maybe), continued seat belt install, possible sunroof install, other fun stuff. Money is tight right now, so I have to make due with the parts I already have until I have a few bucks to spare on the remaining parts I need to finish everything up.

Stay tuned...

[powelli]

Looking good Harrison.

[Colin]

Thanks for posting this, Harrison. My girlfriend and I are going to be doing the glass on our car next week so we have been researching the whole glass installation thing. Very helpful.

[GolfYellowTii]

Your car is looking great. I wish i was as close are you are to finishing.Good to hear that my little article helped you out a bit. If you have problems with some scratches you could try Cerium Oxide with a power drill. I used it on my rear quarter glass for a deeper scratch and it worked out pretty well, I can barely tell the scratch is there but when it is your own you notice thing like that 10x more. I wish I had pictures, but someone stole my digital camera.

[kbken62]

that console is awesome. I would love to make one if I had the tools. My console is beyond saving. The PO put so many screws for nick nacks, I have to completely rebuild it or replace it. There was a guy selling a custom made one that he said he would start producing, but it never materialized. Would you be interested in telling us in more detail how to or even making some and selling them?

Thanks,

ken

[carrosene]

WOW!! That is so pretty and I am so jealous. I need to stop goofing off with scooters and get to work on my 02.