Pimp my own ride

Lots of progress lately. Its getting closer to the time when I can drive it and not be embarrassed, at least not 100%, maybe just 35% embarrassed.

As I mentioned, the interior doors have lovely sound dampening Dynamat on them now.

And yes, there is carpet. Black carpet. With Dynamat underneath. Mmmm Dusty!

A very nice southern gentleman scored some great white interior pieces from a junk yard. Pre-cleanup of the console. Some nice grime and rust! 

I tried some Method brand all purpose cleaner. It did a decent job but even soft scrub couldn't get rid of the rust. So I opted to buy some white paint. I found Rustoleom in a textured style called Hammered. I think it worked out nicely.

And while I'm giving old things a second life. I decided to find out the best way to buff up my dirty black trim inside the car. I saw something somewhere that peanut butter works well to get wax off of black trim and also the oils help shine things up. Worst thing that can happen is my car smells like a Reese's Peanut Butter cup. Not a bad thing. 

Here's Before:

After JIF.

I continued to detail all my black trim with it, and really like the results. Plus its cheap and a natural way to clean.

I also installed the front speakers. Some Polk Audio 5.25"

Also painted the black map pockets and speaker enclosures with, you guessed it, more Rustoleum! And not any, color shifting! Oooohhh, shiny! 

So here is the mostly finished Oxen White vinyl door cards that I ordered from http://www.mtmfg.com/

So far, really happy with the result and I'm excited to get the seat covers I ordered from them as well to finally get rid of the tan for good.

Spring is here... sort of.

Pretty decent weather over the weekend and able to make some headway.

Bye bye icky tan carpet! Stripped everything out, used acetone to clean the metal and added dynamat for sound deadening. The previous owner most definitely had a dog and kept this car in a pasture somewhere. THIS is why I have a shop vac. I also discover some gnarly looking pennies.

In side the door panel, someone left a present. It will be covered with dynamat soon. Such a pity.

Top is UP!

I've been struggling all winter to get my convertible top up. Pro-tip: Don't leave your top down when its cold (yes, this can be applied to other things...) because you will never, ever, get the top to stretch enough to close again. It was 50 degrees today, so I started Mabel up (that's her name now) and put her in the sun for a while. After about an hour I came back and tried to shut the top, it was a little rough, but I did get it closed. Hooray for minor victories!

Booorrrinnnnggg

Nothing much to say except that its winter in Iowa.
Its too cold to even think about being out in the garage. Although the winter has brought me some new goodies to play with when it warms up.

Another friend was able to pick up my boot cover and some misc. parts from the previous owner. So I have THAT going for me. I also have a plastic piece that needs a little MacGuyvering so it will cover the speakers. I have speakers, they are sitting in the box waiting for me to install them. And I am just waiting to thaw out.

Wheelin' and Dealin'

Somehow my knack for a deal has rubbed off on Jeremy and he scored these awesome snowflakes for me! They came off a VW caddy. With tires, center caps, etc. all for $200! They were about 3 hours away, but luckily a friend of ours was headed that direction to visit family. So she was able to pick them up for us.

before

They did need a little TLC in the cleaning up department. Which again, I left to Jeremy. Apparently this is what he used, but I can't attest to any of its effectiveness. I'm told oven cleaner works really well on wheels to degrease. So lets go with that.

after

Here's my cabby before with Le Castellets:

And here is after with the Avus (snowflakes):

All in all an upgrade I'm pretty happy with. I'm going to try to tackle a new top and interior this fall/winter. I'm needing a speaker enclosure so I can put the speakers I purchased in. Need the driver side of this piece highlighted in red. Which apparently isn't easy to find. 

Yeay for Progress!

The Cabby is alive and kicking. We were able to get out the bolt by using some drill bits and lots of PB blaster as lubricant. Replaced the bolt and used some JB Weld on the new bolt. It worked great! There is the minor (major) annoyance of the heat shield noise. The clips were rusted so all the heat sheild does is rattles every time I accellerate.

I know! I'll install the radio and drown out the sound! Not so fast... the radio is another issue. Because what is an old VW without issues?  When hooking up the radio it would give power to the head unit at all times. That means draining my battery which is no bueno. The previous owner appeared to have another wire ran and we tried that. It does turn on when you start the car now and turn off accordingly, but my radio doesn't remember the presets and goes into demo mode everytime I start the car. There must be some way to keep a little power running to it for memory purposes without sending it into reset mode everytime the car is off. I should note that the radio is an ooolllld Pioneer head unit back from my days as a Car Audio supervisor at Best Buy. So, circa 1999. Heh, that's a bit old, but top of the line in its day! I has a cool animation of the twin towers on it and some other nifty charachteristics so I would like to keep it if possible. Might have to go back to the installers and get some pointers as I didn't do that stuff myself. I can handle speakers and easy stuff, but the wiring is a bit mystifying.

Other issues remain: The parking brake. It has the cables ran but the lever is all disassembled and probably missing some bolts. I may try to buy a replacement kit or go to the junk yard and try my luck there.

Holding pattern

Stuck right now in the Cabby progress. Its obvious we are missing parts for the parking break and still have a sheared bolt to contend with that we cannot tackle on our own. It is drivable and I registered it yesterday finally. But would like it to be completely sound before I make a work commute. I have no idea what its going to cost to repair the sheared axel bolt. Will have to do some checking around.