'75 Targa Interior Refurbishment - Project Log

[sobamaflyer]

After 3 wonderful years of ownership I've decided my 911 needs to look more like I think a fine, well taken care of sports car aught to. A recently pondered note to ALL of us, I can clean it up and take pictures from 10' away and she looks pretty darn good, but there are a myriad of little flaws, tears, sags, material mis-matches, holes, etc that the camera doesn't see but my eyes and fingers certainly do. I feel like this is one difference between a truly nice car and a nicely presentable one. And something to keep in mind next time I look at an old car in an ad on-line that looks fantastic.

For the record I jumped in to this car pretty cheap, knowing the pitfalls of that, and in doing so I've had to collect a BUNCH of small missing items. Some aspects of my current interior you will see were "patched up" by me so as not to have completely ugly lack of proper parts [see the rear] but that's about to be rectified.

The Plan:

Dash - Being repaired and re-covered by George at AIR
-Gauges - plastic lenses in Tach and Speedo being replaced with glass from our host, Others will be opened, cleaned and desiccant added to dry them out, Speedo cable and sheath will be replaced so it actually functions.
-Radio - being replaced with a higher line one. I added the one in there, cheap ***** and I've grown to hate it.

Seats - Seat Covers in Cashmere Leather front and rear have been ordered after a bunch of samples have been shipped across the country. I've got carbon seat heaters ready to go under those covers to keep my bum toasty. I'll be dying the good door cards I have with SEM dye and creating rear panels from the one blank that came with my car. I'm going to try and gently remove the black vinyl seat covers (they are 84-9x standard seats btw) and will sell them, they are in nearly perfect shape, the back seats covers aren't worth saving, covered in white paint speckles I can't get off.

Carpet - This one caused me angst but.... I had/have a decent enough and was new, came with my car Appbiz (I believe from conversations with Bob) domestic carpet set. I'm replacing it with Sliverknit also from Appbiz. Placing the new on the old I'm happy I spent the $ on it. [the old set was carefully removed and will be for sale shortly]. I'm adding in Damplifier sound deadening & heat shield where currently there is none on my rear deck.

Doors - I've sourced new pockets that are as they should be instead of my hacked up awful ones - adding Damplifier to the doors in small amounts, adding back in window felts and fixing all the %%$$#@$^& rattles from missing cushion parts. George is also covering my door toppers to match the dash in German vinyl.

Vent windows and trim - being a middie, and loving my brushed targa bar, I'm stripping the flaking, faded black some maroon covered over these lovely pieces with.

Shifter - I've got a Seine Systems shifter kit ready to install, I'll blueprint the shifter while I do it and am replacing all the couplings while I'm in there.

Seals - I've got a new windshield seal from Dan at Carsinc, new targa bar seal, door seals, window rubbers, hood seal & rear targa bar seal. In the category of "pay it forward" my targa bar seal is in lowly acceptable condition, someone gave it to me and it did better than nothing for 3 years, I'll happily send it off to a similarly needy person. I started to leave it on there and my wife fussed at me, "you replaced everything else and you are leaving that one thing in your face ugly?"

So that's the plan. Here are the before pictures for reference (the honest ones, not the glamour shots):

[sobamaflyer]

So in 2.5 hours Sat. afternoon I went from the above to this:





And added a driver's Alum. footboard to the passenger one I've already bought from our host:



Then I encountered what I expected, my poor baby had been left outside as a failed restoration for 3-4 years before I rescued her and drug her home. What numb nutz covers over the factory asphalt with Dynamat? And it's completely incongruent with the rest of the stripped out hot-mess of wanna be race car the rest of her was (I've got to weigh the bucket of this crap I removed).

Thankfully, aside from 2 small holes it's all solid, just surface rust.







And this was last night after the 2nd application of POR-15:

[sobamaflyer]

I'm rather proud of this:





The dark spot on the upper right is a reflection. I still have a bit of work left on the good one and then a polish, this was straight from doctoring with Citrustrip. That stuff is awesome!

[sobamaflyer]

1) Is it necessary to get all the old weather stripping's contact cement off before replacing?



and 2) I've spent 3 years opening my gas cap from the wheel well. Well I finally ordered the proper cable and knob. Can someone tell me what is supposed to be on the end of it? I've got a thought a collet like one uses on control wires for RC aircraft but?

[nineball]

1. yes it's best to remove it all. go to home depot and buy some CitriStrip.



paint it on with a brush, not super thick but a good solid coat. let it sit for a couple hours and then remove. it should get almost all of that out, and what little is left i removed by wrapping a paper towel over a trim removal tool and rubbing/scraping.

take a look at my interior thread for some more ideas and suggestions, particularly applying the damplifier. if you can "seal" your doors with it as i did your speaker response will be 1000x better. also remember that you only need ~25% coverage on the large flat areas (aside from "sealing" the doors). any more and you are just wasting time, product and effort.

good luck! a fresh interior will give you lots of joy for a long, long time.

[sobamaflyer]

Thanks nineball, I've read through your thread several times and was where I picked up the suggestion for the citrustrip and damplifier (after I searched reviews comparing it to several others).

I was afraid of the citrustrip taking off good paint in the door jams along with the glue, no?

It worked wonders on restoring my chrome vent windows :-)

sent from my Galaxy S III

[nineball]

ya it can take off paint but only if you leave it on for quite some time. maybe try leaving it on for only an hour and see what your results were. the good part, if there is one to taking off too much paint, is that the area will be sealed with the new glue and then will be under the rubber trim, so it won't be seen. perhaps you could immediately go over the edges with some paper towels to clean it off and only allow it to sit down in the channel where you need it.

[Ayles]

Do you plan on redoing the headliner of the targa bar? The vinyl front, top and vents where the seat belts mount?

[sobamaflyer]

Originally Posted by Ayles

Do you plan on redoing the headliner of the targa bar? The vinyl front, top and vents where the seat belts mount?

Absolutely, I took it out several months ago because it was flapping in the wind. I ordered extra vinyl from the dash recovering and I'll do it in that.

[Ayles]

I wil be tackling the re wrap in the next few weeks. Seems like a fun project to knock out.

[sobamaflyer]

If you get to it before I do please pass along experience.

[sobamaflyer]

Caution, Citrustrip will give you a wicked chemical burn if you absent mindedly scratch your cheek with it on your gloves

Little more progress, I cleaned up and painted the E-brake handle and controls, painted the seat rails and sanded/painted the gauge binnacle that was faded and annoying behind the gauges.

[sobamaflyer]

So I did a rare thing and farmed out something for my car. Glad I did it looks flippin' amazing. I shipped it to George at AIR and got it back in about 2 weeks. You can see the initial condition in the first post.

[Ayles]

What quantity of por-15 did this take?

I finally got all the parts to put the Targa bar back together. Still trying to source the right kind of foam to replace what was under the bar.

[sobamaflyer]

Originally Posted by Ayles

What quantity of por-15 did this take?

The better part of 3 of the tiny cans did 2 heavy coats.

I bought extra vinyl from the place that did the dash/door tops so I'll be tackling that little project soon. I'll be sure to put it here.

[Ayles]

Thanks, I am actually still debating a need for the por-15. Is it a better safe than sorry product or absolutely necessary once the sound deadening tar type stuff has been removed?

Here is where I am now.

[sobamaflyer]

wow that's clean. You would have to use the metal-prep which etches on yours, then coat. Mine was a mess and POR-15 is a miracle drug on stuff that's already scaly and rusty but not as much on good metal.

I don't think I'd mess with it if mine looked like your's.

[sobamaflyer]

Before:






After about 7 hours of cleaning, bits of painting, odo repairing, etc... :

[tassie targa 76]

I'm in the process of doing the interior as well a refurbed dash pad and door tops but your a bit ahead of me so I will follow you with intent

Regards michael

[sobamaflyer]

Thanks Michael, I came across your thread today and was quite impressed myself by your/your Dad's incredible attention to detail.

I love your vent windows btw, if the classifieds are any indication we possess quite a commodity in them