The 14 Car Performance Therapy Project Rushforths, Baers, Yokohamas, and more

[NOT A TA]

I like the look of gutted race car interiors with their spartan "all business" look. I also like the look of well done complete interiors. My car's kind of in between with carpeting, headliner, and a stock looking dash while also having a full cage, Kirkeys, fire systems, etc. I Removed the heating system leaving the defroster vents wide open and you can see the dash wiring, heat shield, etc. through the openings and also through the speaker grill since there's no speaker there. So I decided to cut out the raised area around the defroster openings and smooth the dash top with a solid panel that will be bonded to the original metal between the dash pad and the windshield. When completed and painted it should look stock but without openings.











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[NOT A TA]

After making the opening for the VIN I roughed up both surfaces to be bonded with 36 grit and modified a bondo spreader to spread the panel bond evenly in cornrows like you would installing bathroom tile .



I used a few clamps to press the pieces together and hold them for 24 hours. The top of the dash being covered is concave and there's compound curves on the ends so I formed the panel as well as I could before bonding and clamped it well.



Filed off the extra 1/16" overhang I'd left around the edges of the aluminum panel and cleaned out the original spot welds on the angled part. Then scuffed the whole area with 180 on a palm sander and primed. Followed that with a skim coat of filler and blocked it out with 180. Will prime and block again before final paint.

[NOT A TA]

2nd gen F body doors are long and heavy. Worn out hinge bushings and pins are common now that they're 35-45 years old. Mine were in good condition still because it was a low mileage car (42,000) when I got it and painted it the first time. Even now at 45 YO only the drivers side hinges showed slight wear when lifting up on the rear of the door. However I figured now's the time to replace them so there's no need to do it once painted and take a risk of scratching/chipping something. The original lower hinge bushings are plastic (really GM?) so no telling when they might split and fall out. Might be the day after paint. I'm sure there's a ton of How To's on hinge repair around the web so I'll skip the instructional rhetoric and just show a couple pics some might gain tips from.









With the hinges replaced it was time to get the doors on and aligned. I was then reminded of the door gap anomaly on the drivers side of almost every early 2nd gen Firebird I've seen. It appears that the door skin wasn't shaped quite right to the fender curve above the door handle part. Welding a piece of rod to the edge of the door and filing/smoothing to create the curve didn't seem like a good use of time to me so I used a little filler in the rear quarter door jamb to even the gap a bit and then did some filing, sanding, priming, etc. to get the gaps on both doors good enough for me on this car. Are they perfect? No, but they're acceptable to me and probably better overall than when the car was new. After final priming/blocking they will be a little better than you see in the pics below.

Yes, I know the horizontal body line is off in the pics below. Previous blocking was done with the door just roughly in place with the old hinge bushings. It'll be straight after some more blocking and final priming/blocking.





Since this was an AC car and I've removed the HVAC the vacuum operated fresh air air duct on the passengers kick panel is no longer functional. I will be blocking off the upper cowl where air is supplied to increase downforce so there won't be anything to feed the duct. I'm also trying to recover the 200 lbs. I added with the roll cage so every little bit helps. The vent duct housing/door/vacuum canister assembly probably weighs a couple lbs. more than the aluminum panels I made to seal off the duct opening and it will get seam sealed when installed so I won't get any wind whistles etc. Drivers side duct opening was sealed by the factory with seam sealer to the plastic kick panel and is getting sealed with an aluminum panel also to increase fire protection. I know the aluminum isn't as much of a fire block as steel but risk of fire entering there is low and so I just figured the aluminum would be better than plastic.

[NOT A TA]

The early 2nd gen Trans Ams had cool looking front air dam fender flares from the factory. Most got smashed eventually on tall curbs, steep driveways and other road hazards so they usually need some repair and both of my front wheel flares were cracked in the usual locations. They were cracked when I got them 20+ years ago and I used some type of epoxy to "fix" them as well as I could with what was available to me at the time. They lasted probably 10 or so years before the cracks reappeared. Now we have other methods available so here's my 21st century repair.

Sanded the flares down to plastic. Hot stapled the cracked areas. Clipped staples off and ground down the stubs below finish level. Applied adhesion promoter and then 3M hard plastic repair material and let cure 24 hours. Sand plastic repair material and prime, fill nicks, then sand/prime till ready for sealer.

[NOT A TA]

Once most of the wheel flares were in final primer I moved on to some of the (many) other exterior pieces that needed to be prepped for body color. Early 2nd gen TA's have a lot of small parts that get paint and is why shops want more to paint them than many other cars from the late 60's -early 70's. On top of that, the first time I painted a lot of the parts that were chrome from the factory and now they all needed to be strripped and prepped as well. The fiberglass rear panel needed some structural repairs as well.

[NOT A TA]

Although I seem to be adding more weight than I'm getting rid of during this project I keep looking for things to put on a diet. The AC equipped 2nd gens had a vacuum operated fresh air duct in the passengers kick panel. Since I blocked off the openings in the sheet metal behind the kick panels I cut out the plastic duct and eliminated it along with the vacuum diaphragm etc. then made an oval plastic block off panel similar to the factory one on the drivers side and attached it with plastic adhesive saving a couple lbs.

Next topic up, subframe modifications.

[WSSix]

I'm enjoying all this detail, John. Thanks for taking the time to write it and post it.

You're very correct about taking your time with the transition areas on a car. I look into jambs and all areas of the car to see how it was painted. It's such a let down to see a great paint job only on the outside of the car.

Good luck!

Oh, and my car's doors don't follow the contour of the quarter panel either. My front fenders at the top don't transition from the hood to door properly as well. I'm not looking forward to making those areas look correct. Luckily, I don't have the folded jambs at the rear of the doors to deal with.