Time to move on tho the driver side panel. There is an extra complexity cause the brass trim strips are floating in space where the vent comes. That will never give a nice fit, and over time it's easy to imagine they will get bent.
This is an example of how it is relatively easy to do, however only after having spent quite some brain energy to sort out how to do it. Doing this kind of projects is 80% thinking/researching and 20% doing.
The brass strips float and are not damage proof...
A steel wire is bent to shape...
such that it nicely surrounds the vent frame
Because it's a PCB , I can solder the wire for a solid bond to the panel.
this is how it looks with the vent removed. At final assembly with the final chrome strips, the strips will be glued to the steel wire and make for a solid frame.
Some plastic bumper 2K glue (I love this stuff) is added for even more strength . The small holes are there to anchor the glue in the board.
Quite satisfied with the result. I used here the other vinyl I talked about in previous post, with the deeper embossing. Not sure I like this better, need to color it green to make up my mind. The ignition switch cover needs to be a smaller diameter too (never understood why it is so big?), now it covers the top strip. Don't like that ;-)
