Insulation done, now on to upholstery and interior trim

Just a quick post to announce that I have now completed installing the three layers of insulation.  The first was a relatively thin, but dense sticky rubber mastic that covered the entire cockpit.  This was the material that Colleen was rolling into place with a wood roller in my last post.  The intent of this first layer is to work its way into all the nooks and crannies and eliminate any rattles or vibrations.  The second layer is a thick, very dense rubber material that will eliminate any louder noise such as impact from road debris.  This second layer covers the entire floor board of the cockpit.  And finally, the third layer is a fairly thin closed cell foam sandwiched between two foil faces.  The intent of this final layer is to block as much heat as possible from entering the cockpit.  This final material is installed on all of the cockpit faces situated close to hot components of the car (engine, transmission, side pipes, etc...).  I doubled up this layer on the driver and passenger foot well walls in an effort to block as much heat from the engine as possible.

There are still quite a few little odd and ends to tackle, but the next big job will be the interior upholstery and interior trim (chrome).

A lot of work....not a whole lot of forward progress.

I know, I know, it's been a LONG time since my last post.  Well, a lot has happened since then with not a lot of progress to show for the effort.  After the test drive, we decided that a few additions would make the car even better.  First, Brad decided the car needed power brakes.  The car had no problem going....so Brad figured a little extra help stopping might be nice.  Second, we decided to add power fresh air intakes for the driver's side and passenger's side foot wells.  And last but definitely not least, two cup holders.  Sounds easy, huh?  Well, let the fiasco begin!!

First, the power brakes.  Brad found a complete setup which included the vacuum brake booster, new master cylinder, new pedals that fit with the system and have the AC logo pedals of the originals and all the necessary screws, nuts, adapters and templates.  See if you can spot a trend in the next few sentences.  The chassis needed to be modified in order for the vacuum brake booster to fit.  In order to modify the chassis the remote brake reservoirs needed to be moved.  In order to move the reservoirs to the new location recommended by the manufacturer, the oil dip stick needed to be moved.  In order to move the dip stick to the new location, the steering shaft needed to be disassembled in order to get enough working clearance.  But wait, there's still more.  In order to get the new pedals in I needed to removed the pedal assembly.  And of course in order to remove the pedal assembly I needed to remove the side aluminum on the driver's side foot box.  And finally, once the new vacuum brake booster was in place the front portion of the brake lines needed to be rerun to the new master cylinder.  It would have been a whole lot easier to say that I had to disassemble the left side of the car, but then you wouldn't have appreciated the comedy of it all.  This all was, of course, rather daunting so I decided to weave the process in with the other two items, the air vents and the cup holders.

Vacuum brake assist.  Notice modified frame bolted into place.

It was a tight fit, which is why so many things needed to be moved around.

New AC pedals.

Relocated reservoirs and new chrome dip stick.

Next, the air vent.  The air vents are basically large flexible hoses that catch air from scoops concealed behind the nose of the car.  The fresh air is pushed along by an in-line fan controlled by two switches (driver and passenger) located under the center of the dash for easy access by either driver or passenger.  The hose is then attached to the top of foot wells with a shut-off gate in case you want to stop all air.  Installing the passenger side air vent was actually very easy because I didn't have to work around much.  I had to wait on the driver's side because I wasn't sure what space would be available once everything mentioned above was moved and installed.

Passenger side fresh air intake tubing.  Tubing to nose of car in front of fan not installed yet in this picture.

Entry into top of foot box.

Shut-off gate inside foot well.

 
And finally, the cup holders.  We decided that two chrome cup holders centered between the seats would be great.  Marking the locations of the steel structure on the transmission tunnel aluminum, I found that I could just fit the holders between the steel frame and the drive shaft below.  Now I have to set the scene just a bit.  While working in the engine compartment to remove all the stuff I mentioned above, I got tired of constantly running back and forth grabbing new tools.  My solution...a board laid across the front chassis of the car to hold all the tools so they were within easy reach.  Brilliant!  Now back to the cup holders.  The  transmission tunnel was already securely fastened to the car so I decided to cut the holes in the aluminum in place with a jig saw.  The first hole went great and I was on to the second.  What I didn't realize was that the vibrations from the jig saw were causing the tools to move ever so slightly toward the edge of the board.  Just as I was completing the second hole, I heard a loud crash as every tool seemed to fall off the board at the same time.  I was sitting in the cockpit of the car at the time and so could not see the front of the car.  I froze and waited for a second in the hopes that everything would be ok.  That's when I noticed the tiny stream of green coolant shooting across the front of the garage and all over the work bench.  I scrambled out of the car as quickly as I could to find a bucket.  So now you have to picture the scene;  It's about 11 at night and I'm standing with a big steel bucket trying to catch all of the coolant as it's shooting from the front of the car.  It was a complete mess with coolant not only shooting about 5 feet through the air but also running out the bottom all over the floor.  Apparently what had happened was that a large screw driver had fallen tip first directly into one of the tiny aluminum fins that makes up the radiator, and then ripped the fin even more as the heavy handle twisted the screw driver down.  For obvious reasons I couldn't get to sleep that night, so I spent a good portion of the night researching if it was possible to fix a radiator leak.  What I found was that there were in indeed fixes, but that they were temporary at best.  The final straw was when I read a post saying that it was cheaper to replace a radiator that an overheated engine!  I had to call Brad the next day with a "I have good news and bad news" call.  The good news was that the cup holders looked great!

Cup holders.  The black is the first layer of sound insulation.

 
I am happy to say tonight that I just completed all of the steps described above except for the driver's side air vent.  A ton of work to basically get back to where we were back in March.  Ok, with better brakes and ventilation.

In the midst of all of this, I did manage to move forward installing sound insulation in the cockpit of the car.  The process involves building paper templates of every potion of aluminum, transferring the template to the rubberized insulation and then installing to the car with a wooden roller to make sure the rubber backing works it's way into all the seams and fasteners.  The kids seemed to like this step and helped out quite a bit.  This step is not complete, but I would estimate that I'm about 75% finished.  Once the insulation is complete, on to carpet and interior finish.

Rolling in the sound insulation.

Hard at work.