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Project Capri. Back on the road! New earths.


danthecapriman

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Another reasonable days progress today.

First thing to do was connect up the wiring for the glovebox. This is just a simple live feed to the glovebox light, then a wire to the switch in the lid, then from that back to the dashboard earths. These had to be repaired which I did a while ago. The switch had broken and the earth wire missing, so a bit of soldering and a new length of wire saw that right.

Then it’s just a case of shoving the glovebox unit back into the dash. It sits on two lugs on the bulkhead with two nuts & washers to hold it, then a few screws at the front and side holding to the rest of the dash. In reality it was a bit of a pig to get back in properly as it’s a bit warped with age! It’s back in, though the lid latch probably needs adjusting a bit so it closes better. Good enough for now though. That also plugs a big hole in the dashboard so it’s looking much much more finished now.

Next job was to refit the indicator stalk. On this car there’s only a single stalk on the steering column being a base model. This controls direction indicators, full beam and the horn. Everything else is from switches on the dash front. I’ve already cleaned it up and cleaned all the contacts up so it can go straight on. Two wiring plugs that just push on and an earth lug to slide on behind one of the two screws that hold the unit to the column.

After that the two steering column trims went back on, just two screws and a clip. And that pretty much completes the dashboard. FINALLY! All that’s left to put back on is the plastic cover for under the dash where the pedals go. Easy to do but I need to finish something on the floor/bulkhead first. Also put the ashtray unit back on.

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Don't worry, I will get the steering wheel cover retrimmed! It is a bit worn.

I must admit, I think it’s looking great now. Even the little grab handle on the passenger side dash doesn’t bother me anymore. I thought it would but now it’s all built up it’s not half as noticeable. 

After that was done I’d had enough of boiling myself in hot cars so had a tidy up, put all my tools and stuff away then hoovered out the car. It’s amazing how much dust and crap starts accumulating when your working on it. Then I dug out the new carpet set I bought a few years back and fitted that loose. Hopefully it’ll level out over the coming week and get rid of the folds and creases from the packaging. Once the last few bits I’m waiting for arrive and go on the carpet set can be refitted permanently.

For now here’s a taste of what it looks like.

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Obviously I've got to put the new underfelt down first, smooth out the carpet and cut out the holes for the gearstick and handbrake (which both also need refitting) but it’s really starting to come together now.

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3 minutes ago, TripleRich said:

Nice job, looks very nice being a black interior too.  Love how it only has 2 switches and 1 stalk.  Now thats a basic car!

Only way to fly!

I like the black-ness of the interior too, I’m much happier with the black than the old brown to be perfectly honest. I was going to pick your brains if you don’t mind...

Do you glue Capri carpet sets down when you restore them? I don’t know wether to glue the new underfelt stuff or not or wether to glue the carpets!? The old stuff didn’t seem to be glued at all anywhere but it was ancient and likely long since lost its sticky-ness. Obviously I’d probably use cans of trimmers spray adhesive if the answers yes?

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From the factory no Capri's (that I know of) had the carpets or sound deadening glued down on the floor.  The carpet was a press fit to the floor pan and was held in place by its own shape, the rear seat, sill trims and those metal tags that look the same as the wiring loom ones.  Same goes for the sound deadening mats under the carpet.  The tags are located on the bulkhead and just slot through cuts in the deadener and carpet to keep it in place.  Other than that they didn't bother and I've never bothered either as I like to keep the freshly painted floor clean of glue if possible.

The only place you'll find glued stuff is in the roof and sometimes under the back seat on a Capri.

However that's if you're using an original carpet.  I see you have a new 2 piece one and I've often had to get the glue out to get to get them looking right.  I use a trimmers spray adhesive and it works well on carpet.  Be very careful if you do end up doing that as peeling the carpet back off the adhesive to correct a mistake will start to pull the fibres off.  The better the carpet the less likely that is to happen, ask me how I know!

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Thanks Rich, 

yes, mines a two piece non original carpet. The original carpet which I’ve just binned was one piece but sadly absolutely destroyed by old age! Based on what you’ve said I think I’ll try fitting it up as best I can and see how it goes without glue to start with. Only using it if I have to. 

The bulkhead underlay mats are original ones and they are a very good fit, moulded to shape and they have slotted onto the little metal tangs ok. The remaining underlay material is all new, pre cut to shape and comes with the carpet set. How well it’s going to fit I don’t know.

Only one way to find out I suppose!

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55 minutes ago, TripleRich said:

Be very careful if you do end up doing that as peeling the carpet back off the adhesive to correct a mistake will start to pull the fibres off.  

I wonder whether spraying the back of the carpet with PlastiDip (or similar) would help with that?  You can certainly use it on the back of rugs etc to stop them sliding on hard floors.

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Dan, the Ghia dash handle looks fine as it is, - so what if it wasn't factory, it looks factory. Like a factory option, similar to those dash map-reading lamps on Mk1s.

It'll give passengers something to hold onto when you're 'doin tha donuts' and 'driftin', yo.

It's all coming together nicely now, the problems you had with the first restorers seems a lifetime ago.

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2 hours ago, Skizzer said:

I wonder whether spraying the back of the carpet with PlastiDip (or similar) would help with that?  You can certainly use it on the back of rugs etc to stop them sliding on hard floors.

Certainly worth a try.  I was rather upset when I messed up the carpet on a customers Mercedes!

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2 hours ago, dozeydustman said:

Excellent Progress, Dan. Ready by the end of the year?

Cheers! I’d like to think so, it’d be nice to get it out at least once before the road salt comes out and ruins playtime. Maybe even bring it out to a Southern Shiters meet up...

1 hour ago, Skizzer said:

I wonder whether spraying the back of the carpet with PlastiDip (or similar) would help with that?  You can certainly use it on the back of rugs etc to stop them sliding on hard floors.

That’s a good idea actually. Wonder if it’d work on the car carpets? I’ll see what happens once it’s back in. The new carpet doesn’t seem quite as moulded to shape as the original did. One thing I have noticed is missing are my sill/door step trims/protectors. They help hold the carpet down too, I can’t remember seeing them for ages though.

1 hour ago, JeeExEll said:

Dan, the Ghia dash handle looks fine as it is, - so what if it wasn't factory, it looks factory. Like a factory option, similar to those dash map-reading lamps on Mk1s.

It'll give passengers something to hold onto when you're 'doin tha donuts' and 'driftin', yo.

It's all coming together nicely now, the problems you had with the first restorers seems a lifetime ago.

Tbh I think the grab handle is ok too now. It bugged me a bit earlier on but now the dash is much more complete it really doesn’t look out of place at all. Like you say, who really cares anyway! I think I get a bit too stuck on things sometimes really, but sometimes you just need to accept these things won’t ever be exactly as they came going on 50 years ago! Compromise is fine. Technically, the wide dartboard wheels I’m using aren’t original either... technically...

Besides, I can’t change that handle now!

It is coming along well now, I actually couldn’t be happier with it really and it’s been good fun putting it together again (for the second time in my ownership of this car!) it has been a drag at times too, the brake pipes pissed me off royally and the dash work took more effort and time than I’d anticipated. But overall I’ve enjoyed doing it!

 

 

 

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Just now, JeeExEll said:

I think it's probably too late to turn back now. :-)

Next project a Mk1 Perana replica?

Hell yes! I’m actually still quite interested and keen on a US spec mk1! Can’t tell you why, but the thought of bringing one over here really appeals.

But a mk3 Cortina is high on my wants list too. Oh, and another Granada! 

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6 minutes ago, dozeydustman said:

Indeed it was, about a year ago in fact. Whiteways cafe at the top of Arundel. Popular place with a decent cafe, bogs and a carpark that makes a good substitute field of dreams.

Someone put a few pics up I think from last time and it looked good! I find it ok up on portsdown hill but space and facilities are a bit lacking really. Maybe worth going to the Whiteways place again sometime?

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19 hours ago, danthecapriman said:

Someone put a few pics up I think from last time and it looked good! I find it ok up on portsdown hill but space and facilities are a bit lacking really. Maybe worth going to the Whiteways place again sometime?

I've been talking to Stanky and he has found another suitable place in Littlehampton. Whiteways on a Sunday is extremely packed with Sunday drive giffers and bikers so room gets very limited - Saturdays are a better bet for Whiteways.

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Got a few more hours this weekend on this. Saturday was minimal, but today went much better!

As mentioned in another post above somewhere, I was waiting for a couple of things to arrive in the post to finish off the floor. Well, these things arrived late last week so today the floor work could be concluded!

The biggest thing missing or wrong with the floor was the drivers footwell/bulkhead sound and heat proofing mat. You can see in one of the previous posts the passenger side footwell had the big grey mat thing installed but the drivers didn’t. That was because the original passenger mat was in good condition so went straight back into the car no problem. The drivers one was in a right shit state. It was ripped and battered to bits and would have both looked awful (despite not being visible after the carpet went in!), and it’d have needed taping back together to have fitted well. Basically in my opinion it needed replacement. Problem was I couldn’t find one to replace it with!

This matting is actually supposed to go back into the car much earlier in the rebuild than I did it as various parts actually pass through it and access for fitting it is better then. But because I couldn’t find a replacement I carried on building the car up anyway. Now though its at the point where it absolutely must be put back if I’m ever going to! I can’t go any further without it. 

So, in the absence of a good replacement I looked at alternatives. This turned up a good pair of mats but they were for a LHD Capri! However that did mean the LHD ones would give me a blank passenger footwell mat in the correct shape that I could then modify to become a RHD drivers side mat... 

Heres exhibit A, the important bits of my original RHD very fucked mat!

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As you can see it is very fucked! But there’s enough of it left here to transfer the required holes etc onto the new LHD ‘blank’ mat.

See exhibit B,

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This is a pair of LHD mats. The passenger one is a very good shape match for the RHD floor and bulkhead metalwork on my car so no problem there, but obviously it’s missing almost all of the holes. I initially thought I could simply flip over the LHD drivers mat on top of the passenger one, trace around the holes and it’d be fine. It’s not though because everything is slightly further over on RHD and some holes were mirror image of each other! Plan B was to put the useful bits of exhibit A (my original fucked mat) on top of the LHD blank mat, trace the holes and cut them out! 

Here you can see the difference in positions of the holes. The black marked holes with an X in them are correctly positioned for RHD. The brownish ones are from flipping the LHD drivers mat over onto this one, and are actually miles off so it’s a good job I thought about this before just diving in with the knife!

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Long story short, this stuff is thick and hard and was a twat to cut through. I succeeded eventually although it’s not quite as nicely cut as the factory holes are! Still, it’s 100% better than what I did have and you won’t see it anyway! I just couldn’t stand the thought of not putting this mat back into the car! I also had to cut a few slits into it to open the holes so I could fit it without stripping out most of the steering column etc again. Not perfect but it’s my only option at this point.

Heres the mat back in the car to prove that it is actually there!! And yes, getting it in under the dash was incredibly difficult and frustrating!

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With that bit now done I could move on to fitting the brand new carpet under felt.

This came in a set with the new carpet. It’s thicker than the original stuff and covers much more of the interior of the car than originally too so should do a much better job. It’s fairly straightforward to figure out what goes where but some of it does need trimming to fit perfectly. Also, because this stuff covers much more it has to be glued down to hold it in shape etc. I tried doing it without but it just will not stay where it’s put or follow the shapes of the transmission tunnel, curves and corners etc. All I used was a tin of cheap spray carpet adhesive, lightly used just to hold it all tight.

So, goodbye to all those silver sound deadening mats I put down and hello green fluff!!

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That makes quite a difference doesn’t it!? That’s what I like tbh as it’s a big difference which must mean big progress!

Its actually easy to do. I started by hoovering out the floors to get rid of any dust etc from the dry run I did then started with the front transmission tunnel section as that had a small hole for the gearstick. Once satisfied it’s central and pushed up under the heater outlet I glued it down then opened up the gearstick hole to fit snugly around the hole in the floor. Once you’ve done that you can work outwards fitting the other sections up to it. I did front floor pans after the transmission tunnel, then the rear transmission tunnel section, then rear floor pans. For curved panels and raised sections I just put a bit of extra glue down and stretched the carpet out and smoothed it down against the panels bit by bit. For the floor pans, start in the middle and smooth outwards to follow the panel shapes and push out any air pockets & bulges etc.

All I will need to do later is go around and poke holes though for things like the gearstick gaiter, handbrake gaiter etc securing screws holes and the seatbelt anchor bolt holes etc etc. 

Hopefully next weekend should see the carpets installed...

 

 

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Hat doffed for another job done properly, using decent carpet felt rather than the domestic underlay I opted for in the 940 is the way forward long term I recon. 

It'll no doubt feel lovely underfoot once the carpets are down and should help a good deal with sound deadening too I'd imagine.

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  • 5 months later...
12 hours ago, Austat said:

Any more news on this project?

Not much tbh!

I got to the point of getting the sound proofing stuck down, as per my last pic update, then I got the carpets out of their bag and payed them loose on top ready to fit them in place permanently. Unfortunately however the United Kingdom is a wet cold depressing pile of utter wank and it started pissing with rain after that. Here we are 6 months later and it still hasn’t stopped! Which meant the car was put in its garage and there it’s stayed ever since, as I can’t get it outside to work on it with the weather being so bad. Even on the rare day here or there it hasn’t rained I can’t rely on it staying dry enough for long enough to get the car out. It pisses me off immeasurably tbh but that’s the great British winter for you (fucking grim!). So instead, I’ve done other things, or done bits & bobs on my other cars where the weather is less an issue.

One thing that never stops though on this project is keeping an eye out for good parts, either to replace missing bits or replace things that aren’t up to the standard I want! So far I’ve managed to get a good few assorted bits and pieces and various fixings and screws etc. But the other day I spotted something on eBay that would help a lot with this car. Being eBay (and old skool ford tax) meant it was likely going to end up costing me a bit but I lobbed a bid on it and won!

It was a pair of mk2 chrome bumpers in almost as new condition! The chrome is almost completely perfect and original, they’re both pin straight with no dings or damage and both the rubber rub strips are in excellent condition (only a tiny graze on one corner bit). They’ve been in storage for many years which is probably why they’re so good still. Yes, they did cost a fair bit, but then again so would rechroming and straightening my other bumpers so imho this is a cost worth paying. Plus, it’s parts that are highly visible after the cars finished so it needs to be good! I’ll get a pic or two of them at some point but for now they’re wrapped up in bubble wrap in the Volvo’s boot until I can get them fitted!

All they should need is a wash, chrome polish and I’ll spray the backs of them up with some Dynax UB wax to help protect them. This also now leaves me with 3 pairs of chrome mk2 bumpers!! They all have value though as they’re a popular mod for mk3 Capri’s aswell as mk2’s. So I’ll use the best pair I’ve just bought and I might sell one other pair? The last pair I’ll keep as a spare set.

Anyway, hopefully it’ll start drying up a bit soon since it’s now March. Spring is just around the corner!

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  • 1 month later...

It’s now April, the suns out, it’s warm & dry and the utter misery that is the winter is now gone. Thank fuck! That means it’s now time to kick off the 2020 season of laying under old cars getting angry and swearing!

 

I thought I’d ease myself into it by doing something that will make a big difference to the car quickly. That way I can give myself a bit of a confidence boost to crack on!

So, bumpers.

Ive been at a bit of a loss as to what to do with these. I’ve got the original pair from my car, which have ok/reasonable chrome and good rubber rub strips still but they’re let down a bit by being a bit buckled and bent!

At some point some years ago I found a mk2 in a local scrap yard so pillaged the bumpers and various other bits from it’s utterly rotten corpse. These are very straight, but the chrome isn’t great - they’ll polish and clean up well but I’m not sure they’re quite up to my standard for this car. These ones are also GT/Ghia items with the two black plastic over riders.

I wasn’t sure which to use tbh, and whatever I did I was almost certainly going to be needing a rechrome, which means having to separate the black rub strips from the metal bumper - doing this will most probably break the fixings as they rust and seize!

So I’ve put the job off but kept an eye out for some good replacement bumpers. A pair appeared on eBay about a month or so back so I bid and won. When they turned up they were absolutely gorgeous! Very straight, very good chrome and the rub strips are very good too with no broken fixings. The only slight issue is the front bumper has been stripped of its mounting irons and number plate brackets as the last owner was going to fit them to a mk3. This also meant the chromed dome headed bolts that attached these parts to the bumper were also missing. Good job I’ve got plenty of spare bumpers then!

First job was a clean up of the eBay bumpers. They were good anyway tbh but they’d been in storage for a long time so we’re a little dull and dusty. I’ve washed them front and back, then broke out the chrome polish & a bit of elbow grease to buff them up. Finished off with some black trim polish for the rub strips. Once that was sorted I’ve checked over the backs of the bumpers, which are in excellent condition with minimal signs of rust and the given them a good covering with Dynax UC underbody wax. I did the usual with this and left the bumpers and the can of wax out in the sun for an hour to warm up then spray them. This just makes the wax as thin and runny as possible which then allows it to creep into all the gaps and seams etc. The only things on the bumpers really are the mounting brackets but if it helps keep the rust out then it’s all good!

The finished articles look amazing imho! The pics don’t do them justice really, for chrome that’s seen going on 50 years of life they really are exceptional. If you put them in the sun and walk past them they look like liquid!

Backs of the rear bumper.

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Now the shiny side!

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This is the worst bit on them. One corner of one rub strip has had a little graze. I can’t say I’m going complain though, they’re very old and you can’t have it all, can you!

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After that I went and dug out the other front bumpers and robbed the mounting irons, number plate brackets and a few of the chrome dome head bolts to fit to the polished up front bumper. This took bloody ages, as the number plate bracket bolts were seized solid and I didn’t want to damage anything getting them free! Managed in the end at the expense of a few hours!

This evening I’ve scrubbed all the brackets and the irons with a wire brush, and left them to soak in rust remover overnight. Tomorrow they’ll be primed in acid etch then sprayed satin black. 

The leftover two pairs of bumpers can go in the loft as spares now too, so that’s another corner of the garage cleared!

 

 

 

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They look great! Glad you managed to avoid having to get them rechromed - I know from experience that it is usually expensive, but even that does not necessarily equate to a good job. The only place that I've consistently heard good feedback about, and seen the long-term results, is Derby Plating.

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11 hours ago, mat_the_cat said:

They look great! Glad you managed to avoid having to get them rechromed - I know from experience that it is usually expensive, but even that does not necessarily equate to a good job. The only place that I've consistently heard good feedback about, and seen the long-term results, is Derby Plating.

It wasn’t something I was particularly pleased about having to do tbh, I’ve heard there’s a lot of places doing the plating but not doing it well. Aswell as being expensive it seems a lottery regarding quality. Plus, there’s a good chance I’d break the rub strips taking them off. These ones are lovely now, but I’ll just have to make the effort to keep them that way! I paid £400 for these two bumpers, I’d expect more than that to rechrome and straighten the other bumpers though, so I’m still calling this way a win!

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