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1980 Austin Princess


vulgalour

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12 minutes ago, NorfolkNWeigh said:

Might be worth explaining to the driver how average speed cameras work too...

Also keep a copy of the photo for when your plate was also snapped doing 85 in a 60 on the back of the truck and you have to present it to the court and explain how their robotic cameras can't tell the difference.

 

Phil

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Tucked up safe and sound at home.  @Wingz123 was top notch delivering the Princess, if you need stuff shifting, I highly recommend him.  A big old thank you for him doing the big pile of driving today for a very reasonable fee.  Absolutely trouble-free from start to finish and a lovely bloke to boot.  Because of house stuff I'm not sure exactly when I'll be getting stuck in on the Princess, though we have a tentative plan outlined for March with my friend over in Lincolnshire and the only thing I currently need to find is my valve spring compressor now that the new gasket set has arrived so I can build the head again.  I'm really happy to have the Princess at my new home, it hasn't been the same the past few weeks without it about and I have missed it very much.

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We're closing in on the eight year ownership anniversary now, and it's been through a lot of house moves with me.  It's become more than the sum of its parts.

@Parky unfortunately nothing really interchanges on that engine and the one in the Princess, which is a shame because sometimes I think fuel injection would be kinda neat.

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Today I got the Princess emptied out of the spares that were in it and found my valve spring compressor in a garage box.  I've a suspicion I've the wrong head type on the compressor for the Princess head though, I'll find out when I have time to try it out.  The Princess does look to be slightly shorter than the BX so it will fit in the garage a bit easier that way, unfortunately it's also a bit wider and that means I'd really struggle to get in and out of the car once it was in the garage. Car port building it is then.

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After a good inspection of the things I put back together loosely I can confirm that nothing appears to be missing under the bonnet and it shouldn't be too much work to get everything apart that I need to when I get into it.

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  • 1 month later...

A tiny micro update today.

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The trim rings I had fitted previously were okay but, being chrome plated steel, well past their first flush of youth. I've also no idea what the trim rings I had fitted were off, certainly not a Princess originally. These are from a Volvo 240 and appear to be stainless steel, the chunky square shoulder suits much better than the rounder shouldered trims I previously had fitted and is closer to the original Princess option. I gave up looking for proper Princess beauty rings some time ago, they're quite a rare item.

A couple of dry days when I've got time spare to be in the garage and I can get the head ready for the valve swap and then try and align schedules to get over to Lincolnshire for the valve re-shim job. Admittedly, I could get the valves shimmed locally most likely, I could probably even do it myself, but it's nice to have an excuse to visit friends and it's not like I'm having to rely on the Princess as my only car. I think when the nicer weather arrives, I'll be able to go places and get back to enjoying just going for a drive again.

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  • 1 month later...

Hey there, kids, it's time for an update!  Weather is scorchio and while I can't go out and get supplies, I do have some in for doing a bit of prettying up on the Princess.  Also, even though all the parts aren't yet here to do the head, they are on the way so I decided to remove that too.  Head out first I think.  This was very easy because I'd only loosely bolted things together.  Old rubber floor mat from the BX was ideal for plonking over everything to keep it all nice and clean.

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Popped the head in the boot and then had a check to make sure nothing else needed removing or moving and spotted a big crack on what I assume is the original bit of vacuum hose that goes between brake master cylinder and exhaust manifold.  the pipe was so knackered it shattered on removal.  I do have some hose in stock now, annoyingly none of it is this size.

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Also annoyingly is the failed clamps on the new coolant hose install.  I didn't buy the clamps from the same supplier as the hose, I think I raided what Mike had in his massive hose clamp pile.  Suffice to say I'll be replacing all of these with decent quality clamps since I don't want any of these to let go.  I don't even know where the worm drive screw has gone, it's just not there any more.

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That's as far as I could get mechanically today.  I'll order up the extra bits I now know I need so they'll be ready to install when the bits that are in transit get here and I've done the other jobs.  That meant I could move on to some cosmetic work, namely the front of the car that's been bugging me for a while because it looked incredibly scruffy.  This is just a splash-and-dash rather than a super perfect paint job, both to tidy things up and to try out the new colour split for the front end to see if I liked it.  Here we go.  Outer headlights removed to make it easier to get tools in to undo the nuts holding the sidelight-indicator housings in place, plastic trims off  to get access to the bits that need painting, then a quick and dirty sand all over with 400 grit.

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Printer paper masking employed since that's all I've got in and nowhere is open to get paper from today, does the trick.  Squirt of red on the sanded bits without worrying about masking off the beige bits.

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Paint left to harden enough that masking tape won't damage it and then remasked before the beige is splodged on.  I could have just run the split line across so the bottom of the headlight surround was red, I just didn't think this would work as well as bothering to mask the surround of the headlight and grille area.

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Yep, I'm happy with how that looks.  Obviously needs filler and fettling to make it look right, for now it looks tidy and tidy is good enough.  I do really like the colour split much better this way.  Next was to slap all the plastic trims and lights back on, et voila!  That looks heaps better.

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Last job was the other half helping to unbolt the bonnet so that tomorrow, if the weather is nice, it'll also get a splash-and-dash of beige all over since I'm finally at the point where I feel comfortable making that big panel shiny.  Doing this has given me a massive mojo boost with the car and reminded me of just how attached I really am to it.  It's a bit scruffy here and there and that's okay, I can keep it smart with Rustoleum and soapy water pretty much indefinitely and just enjoy it for what it is.

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First job today is to immediately make the car look much worse by pulling the bonnet off.

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I had almost two cans of beige paint left which I knew would be enough to get a mostly uniform finish on the bonnet but perhaps not a final finish since it is a very large panel.  In a perfect lesson on exactly how not to spray paint something, my set up involved a windy garden and panel stands made from balanced bits of broken old furniture.  I had not entirely thought this job through.

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I needed the bonnet at an angle so I stood a chance of being able to spray the whole thing  without hitting it while trying, something I couldn't do if the bonnet was laid flat.  As with the front panel, this really is just a case of a quick tart up rather than a proper job, just to keep rust etc. at bay.  I knew full well I'd be going back and redoing this when I had more paint to use.  Not quite enough paint in those two cans so while the finish is moderately uniform, it's also still quite stripey.  I'll order some more paint and do the nicer coats in the garage where it's more sheltered and when I have the space to empty the garage out.  As you can tell from the garden, our outside space is in flux while we try and process several years of overgrown garden and general rubble, so it's not exactly an ideal time to be doing this.

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While that was drying and getting grit and bugs blown all over it, I returned to my work bench to deal with the next job of the day.

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Not exactly the kindest on my back but at the moment, it's the most sensible option I have.  I still don't have a proper workbench and it causes friction if I bring not-cleaned engine bits into the house to work on so this is my current solution.  Cosy.  I unbolted the cambox and removed the buckets and shims, being sure to number the buckets as they were put in the box.  I did see some little bits of rubber on the buckets as I removed them so I wasn't sure what I was going to find when I got the valves out.

Happily, no broken springs, collets, or washers, and no signs of cracks or other damage to the valve guides.  Camshaft and bearing surfaces all look okay too so it was looking moderately good so far.

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With all that out I could see where the little bits of rubber were coming from; the valve stem seals (only four on this engine) had been destroyed when the valves were bent.  I dug around and retreived all of th bits I could, in particular the metal parts of the stem seals.

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Then I could pack everything away in the boot to keep it all safe until the rebuilding parts arrived.  Bolts back in holes, etc to keep everything together.  I left the oil on the surfaces to serve as protection on the steel components rather than cleaning everything at this point.

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The valves are all bent, to varying degrees.  I haven't dismantled any of the block because I know the engine turns freely and there's no worrying signs on the bores or any sort of slap in the pistons or anything like that.  I'm pretty sure the valves basically served as sacrificial components and while it's annoying that this happened at all, at least I did manage to find a full set of brand new valves to go in and put everything right again.

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By the time I'd done all that it was lunchtime, so I had a break to give the paint on the bonnet chance to cure and then after a while the other half helped me refit it.  Unfortunately, one of my bonnet rams is now leaking so I'll need to replace that, it had been making a groaning noise for a while so I knew it wasn't in the best health.  The rams do the job they need to do for now, it's just something to add to the list.

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Refitting the bonnet was quite easy with two of us and even lined up fairly well, requiring the most minimal of adjustments to get it fitting properly.  The paint is a bit stripey because I didn't have quite enough paint to put as thick a coat on as I would have liked.  It's still quite an improvement and when I have more supplies I'll do a better job of this and paint the inside of the bonnet too.  I also need to replace the bonnet insulation panel because that's started to disintegrate now.

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I think that overall, these past two days have seen quite an improvement in the Princess' appearance.  I've also ordered a new length of plastic chrome insert for the windscreen seal because I've decided I'm not fighting with the stainless trims.  I'll also be fitting the new windscreen seal I got through the club a while ago since the seal on the car has now started to break up and the original chrome insert is brown and starting to pull out of the corners because it's shrunk so much.

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Another frippery arrived in the post for a job I've been meaning to do since I got the car.  I was very fortunate a few years ago to get some series 1 stainless steel windscreen (front and rear) trim inserts, I'd installed the full set on the rear window and it looked pretty good.  Bit of a faff to fit since there isn't (to my knowledge) a standard tool you can use like you can the thinner seal beading/insert stuff so you have to finegle everything together with a screwdriver or similar.  I was happy with this and all set to put the front one on once I had all the other bits and bobs I needed, like a new windscreen seal and all that.  Then I found I was stripping chrome off the car, keeping it limited to certain areas, and that series 1 stainless trim started to look a bit too heavy and out of place.  I decided it had to go and I'd return to the original spec plasti-chrome inserts, which I got from Woolies.  The Princess takes the 11mm flat-backed insert rather than the pointed back sort.

The rear was fairly easy to do and I'd had the foresight to save the original corner trims when I removed the old trim, these corner trims are I'm told unavailable and they're quite fragile so reinstalling them was a little nerve wracking.  Looks smart though.

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The rear seal isn't perfect, much like everything else.  It is good enough and does what it needs to do so I won't be replacing it any time soon.  With that done it was time to move onto the front which was much worse in every regard.  Now, I do have a new rubber seal to go in and I could have waited until I was ready to fit that before doing the new insert, and perhaps I should have.  Thing is, I want to fit a new windscreen with my new windscreen seal, and I want to sort out the paint on the windscreen surround and A pillars before I fit those, and I don't have all the items to do that yet.  Instead, I just wanted to replace the really bad old insert bead and get some more practice in on fitting the stuff, as well as cosmetically improving the car a little bit while I have some free time to spend.  The old insert had shrunk really quite badly and was deformed on the lower corners where the old windscreen seal was breaking up.

 You can see the bad paint I want to sort out here too, that's from that historic respray the car had in the 90s before I got it and is probably the last bit of that to deal with now since I've basically stripped everything else back, in some places to bare metal, to undo previous issues.  It's quite remarkable how large the gap is at the bottom of the screen insert, this isn't missing beading, that's how much its shrunk.

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Removing the old beading was very easy, simply lift one end and peel it out of the seal.  Obviously this old insert is no good to tell me how much new insert I need so I just did the same as the rear screen and rand the new insert beading off the roll I'd bought until I had enough installed.  There's a stark difference between the condition of new and old.  The old insert jumped out as being completely knackered, while the new you don't even notice, which is exactly what you want with this sort of job.

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As with the rear screen, on the front I used an old toothbrush to clean out any dirt and debris that was in the channel so I knew everything would sit in smartly.  The bottom corners were difficult because the seal is disintegrating, so extra care was required there.

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A marked improvement on fit at any rate.  I was really happy with the join on the insert too, that trimmed pretty much perfectly.  The car didn't have a joiner piece here when I got it, I imagine there should be one to cover the seam, I'm yet to find one that's the right type for this kind of insert.  The top corners went much easier, the seal is okay there, though you can see where its starting to break up and go spongey.

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With that done I remembered I had found my box of O rings on a recent garage sort and that I needed one in one of the high level indicators.  Found what I thought was the right size, fitted it between lens and bezel and went to fit it on the car.  Then found it was far too thick to allow the locking tabs to sit in the bezel so had to dig out a much smaller thinner one than I thought would be suitable.  Fits perfectly now, and that should stop water getting in there.  I do need to redo the orange on this lens, because of the missing seal the paint I used has shrunk and cracked so it's not as orange as the other side which hasn't done this.

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I have more things arriving in the post that I'm looking forward to fitting, namely some new carpetting, some vinyl dye, and some new door mirrors (can never have too many door mirrors!) which will see some improvements to the cohesion of the car's colour scheme inside and the brightwork on the outside.  I've also got changes afoot for the front end of the car, the MG B indicator-sidelight units are making way for hidden sidelights in the headlight bowls (found the holders for that on the same recent garage sort), and some more subtle indicators at the front which I'll decided upon when I dig out the indicators I know I have in a box somewhere to see if they're suitable.  The engine rebuild is still scheduled to be done too, we just have to wait for the world to return to normal first.  The thing that's really been helping out is the other half really wanting to see the car look its best, to the point they were asking about when I was fitting the Lotus alloys and what did they need to be sorted, etc.  It's really nice to have that sort of motivation from someone that's just as enthused to see this car done as I am.

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hmmmm, I don't actually think the Mini finisher will suit. Especially now I have looked at your fillet on an actual computer where I can see it better....

 

Oh well, I have taken the pics so you can decide

This is the Mini fillet for reference

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And the finisher

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That's very different, isn't it?  The Princess trim is almost flat and has a stepped flange on the outer edges to hold it into the rubber seal.  It looks a lot thicker than the material on the rear seal trim corners which aren't much thicker than nice paper, so I reckon even if I squashed it into the right shape I'd struggle to get it into the seal.  At least we know now, that's something.  My camera is not playing ball getting a picture so I dug out Woolies' page for the photo they have which shows how different the trims are. https://www.woolies-trim.co.uk/product/1763/chrome-screen-insert

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Some frivolities have been arriving for the Princess and I had some pre-work free time today and glorious weather, so smooshed the lot together for this update.  First job was to trim the heel mat for the new carpet so it was actually square and then round the corners off nicely.  I'm planning to sew this in place with a double line of stitching around the edge, it and the carpet are towards the upper end of what my sewing machine can handle so hopefully it will go smoothly.

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Then I got the dye out that came from https://www.vinyldye.co.uk/ They get a recommendation for speedy service and loads of information to make sure I stand the best chance of a great result.  They seem like a company that actually cares about customer service, so that's reassuring, especially since I'll be ordering from them again very soon.  I'm using the TRG range of dye for today's job.  The cans are quite small, they contain enough to do one of the Princess' front door cards which is in line with their guide for coverage.  Coverage is actually really good too, I was going from a mid-beige (similar to the carpet in the first picture of this update) to this maroon which is the sort of colour change that's likely to leave things blotchy.

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I had a full set of interior vinyl from another Princess in the mink colour and it was in comparable condition to the black vinyl currently fitted.  Rather than redye the good black set, I decided it best to redye the slightly sunfaded mink set and make use of some spares.  This also meant that if I didn't like the new colour I hadn't spoiled the black interior that I tolerate and wouldn't have to go and buy more dye to undo what I'd done.  As it happens, I actually really like the new colour, it's as close to what I wanted as I could have got with an off the shelf option.  The finish is also very similar to the original vinyl finish which is also very satisfying since it looks the right age to be in the car.

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2 cans did these handles, the kick panels in the front, the B pillar trims, and the small bit of vinyl that goes on the inner seal next to the rear seat that's only seen when you sit in the rear seat. I chose this maroon rather than a bright red in part mainly because it picks up on the maroon on the outside of the car.  I also thought a scarlet would be too intense for this particular car and look out of keeping with the rest.  The finish is very shiny looking while its wet, and mellows out nicely over the course of an hour or so, once dry it's a good factory looking satin finish.  Made use of some stacking crates and the glorious weather today to do the spraying outdoors, a good idea since it's fairly strong smelling stuff when you're spraying so I'd recommend avoiding doing it indoors.  Once dry, there isn't much of any smell at all. I removed the finisher for the lock pin and masked off the weather stripping, those will be staying black, as will the speaker grille and the surround for the door release handle, this will make sense later.

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Offered the new floor mat and one of the dyed pieces of vinyl to the new carpet to see how well it all matched and I'm pleased that the shades are just a tiny bit off from each other which is precisely what I was looking for.  I didn't want the carpet and the vinyls to be exactly the same colour, I wanted the interior to look more like a rare option than something someone had dyed at home.

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Next up was the carpet.  I'd already measured and done a mock-up of the pattern piece layout before placing my order to minimise wastage.  All those years laying out patterns for clothing really helped with this.  I only had one inner sill carpet to work from, the other had long since disintegrated, but since they're a mirrored piece that's not a problem.  I'm using a tufted rubber backed carpet that's very similar to what is currently in the car, this carpet is closer to the carpet used on the inner sill pieces, original Princess floor carpet has a thicker rubber backing, and earlier cars had a different carpet pile to later cars... along with other changes.  Anyway, suffice to say I picked the one that was the best compromise of appearance and construction, I didn't go for the super cheap modern type or the expensive wool blend Proper Classic type, I went in the middle, just like BL did.   The new carpet is wide enough to lay the front and rear floor sections out across the width, instead I turned them ninety degrees so I could run the sill carpet pieces down the side.  This meant there would be really minimal wastage and no room for error.  The original Princess carpet has a slight shape to it over the central tunnel (not a transmission tunnel since nothing transmissiony goes down it) but not enough that it could really be considered moulded.  Flat carpet will deform enough to do this in too big almost-squares.  No binding is required either, there was never any from the factory, the floor pieces overlap the sill pieces and then vinyl and door rubbers cover the raw edges where needed.

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With the pieces layed out, I carefully flattened and traced with a white tailor's chalk.  I considered using a marker pen at first until realising if I made a mistake I wouldn't so easily be able to remove it, which is exactly what did happen but since I'd used a tailor's chalk it was easy to rub it out with my hand and redraw the line.

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I made the front carpet a little wider than the outline because that gives me a little more room to adjust it if I need to, it has to bend a lot more than the rear carpet and I'd like some wiggle room with getting a good fit.  With all the pieces cut out, vacuumed, and set aside to be fitted I really didn't have a lot left over.  These pieces might come in useful somewhere so I've not binned them just yet.

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I can't fit the carpet until I've got the seats out and I don't want to take the seats out until I've finished dying the vinyl, and since I didn't order enough tins of dye to do all the vinyl I'll place another order so the job can be completed.  Carpet came from https://www.woolies-trim.co.uk/ who have been recommended variously and I'm happy to put my recommendation on their products too, I've had excellent service from them thus far and the products are always well described.  The other items of note are the new door mirrors, which are the style I had been trying to find with a large mirror head rather than the smaller original types as seen on French cars and Rovers of the 70s.  They're not the highest quality, but they'll do, and are fully adjustable.  They look nicer than the Honda Acty ones currently fitted while having a very similar sized mirror head so they make me happy.

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The last item for today is the new indicators.  I went for a more expensive option than I could have both because they looked of better quality (and they feel it in person) and because they take an incandescent bulb rather than LED.  These are usually for larger motorbikes so they'll be fine for my purposes and the bulb size is nice and big.  Ordered black because I will be fitting them behind the front grille so they're hidden until turned on.  The sidelights will be moving into the outer headlights since I found the original sidelight holders for those and then, when my welder is up and running, the cross bar under the headlights and grille will get smoothed out so the front end will look very clean while still being functional.

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Right then, off to order more stuff so I can finish this interior job I guess.

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The door cards and handles look great, I really like the colour, it will be a huge improvement over black. The carpets are interesting also, I am interested in attempting upholstery repairs in some of my cars. What sewing machine would you recommend? I will be looking in the budget/ used ( low price).

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Sewing machine and sewing recommendations can be found in this handy thread: https://autoshite.com/topic/39689-sew-what/ which I'll be adding more things to when I get back into sewing, bit stuck for supplies at the moment.  In short, get an old metal Singer, it should do everything you need providing it's one of the heavier duty models

It's another lovely sunny day here, perfect for fighting interiors... no, no it's not.  It's horrible for fighting with interiors, the car is like a greenhouse. OH WELL.  First item to install was the inner sill carpet, which is held in place with some trims that screw on over the door seal.  Then it was the B pillar trim, front kick panel, and small triangle of trim next to the rear seat.  That all went quite smoothly really.  Moved on to the door cards and furnishings and I'm incredibly happy with how it all turned out.  It looks right.  I'm in two minds at the moment about keeping the pretty much brand new plain black door seals, or saving up for the expensive flocked red door seals, either works fine really and keeping the current ones does save me a fair chunk of cash.

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Next was the carpets.  Rear carpet was very easy to install, as it always is, the only fly in the ointment there was it's a tiny bit narrower than I would have liked, so it doesn't butt right up to the inner sill.  The problem area is hidden by the rear seat and there isn't exposed flooring so it's not a problem being me being picky.  The front carpet was a little more troublesome, adding the extra width to my template was very sensible since that meant the carpet actually ended up fitting perfectly instead of being too narrow.  It needs a little extra trimming around the front wheel arches where three planes converge, but otherwise went in perfectly fine.  It's a lot easier to find the holes for the screws and bolts that go into the floor with this carpetting than it was with the original, so that's a nice bonus.

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I will be leaving the dashboard, steering wheel, and centre console, black.  Doing these in red would be too much red.  The felt inserts on the parcel tray I'm going to redo in the remnants of new red carpet if I've got enough.  I really like how the red goes against the reveneered dashboard, much more so than the black.

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Then I was out of time for the day.  Tomorrow I have to remove the front carpet at least to get the new heel mat sewn in.  Plonked the seats in the car to keep them safe and to see if they work in original plain black.  They don't.  I'll be dying the vinyl on the seats to match the door cards but leaving the velour black, I'll also probably leave the head restraints black.  I've also not got the speaker grilles fitted here, they're normally rivetted on and these are the door cards I pilfered the speaker grilles and speakers from to go in the parcel shelf.  I'll probably fit new speakers to the doors rather than the door cards, and rivet the speaker grilles back onto the door cards to finish this area off properly.

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