accordionfolder said:that Wyzenbeek individual doesn't double rub the car more than 30,000 times, we're good. <... snip ...>I lol'd. This is my new favorite arbitrary system of measurement.
Hey that is hardly 'arbitrary', from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martindale_(unit)
It seems like a reasonable test if you're trying to determine how furniture upholstery will age. Looks like I could pretty easily get the seats recovered in this without much concern. Won't tell us how the suede substitute deals with sweat, but at least it's pretty clear that it won't go threadbare.
Keith Tanner said:Just realized I didn't post the picture that best shows off the way the car looks in person.
SCOREBOARD!!!!!......and my suggestion of machined turned on the the door cards has no business being in these confines seeing this .....well done
In reply to Ottawa :
"the textile sample is rubbed against a standard abrasive surface with a specified force"
I meant in the loose sense that all units are "arbitrary" - why is a meter a meter or a foot a foot? Because someone picked some distance, they may have had a good reason, but it's no more or less useful than other measurements - it's just the one we agreed on. Some person was like, "check it - I can rub this fabric 10k times with 1 lb hung from it before it shows appreciable wear" - and everyone was like: "word" - pretty arbitrary.
A meter is even goofier, and has changed multiple times....
Anyways ... I hope no one comes and rubs too much on your very nice looking upholstry - I'm taking notes for my builds....
We are moving forward!
Cut to the money shot: white door panels are the way.
Details. I painted the panels in a semi-gloss white. It's not a fantastic paint job but hey, I forgot to put reducer in the white paint on the tub so we have a low bar here. I added a bit of Thermo-Tec Cool-It (the same stuff that's on the tunnel) to a couple of spots on the back of the panel and also attached it to the upper pads. This cut down on rattles and general flimsiness.
The stock door panels are made of masonite or something with a padded vinyl cover. This means they're a lot thicker than whatever that aluminum I bought was - I forget the gauge, but it's something like 0.020". So all the various door bits and pieces had a gap behind them. This meant I needed some sort of washer-like things. I drew them out between coats of white paint and cut a few prototypes out of hardboard on the laser. But I have a shelf full of acrylic...
As it turns out, I needed 6mm of spacer and that's 3mm acrylic. So this happened.
Too much? Maybe. I can always cut it out of black. We'll see how much it makes me smile.
I disassembled the dash and gave it a quick scuff.
This dashboard has had a long, hard life - first in a car that was left to sit outside, demolished, then chopped up and used in the race car for 12 years or so including multuple installations and removals through a cage. Here's the donor in 2003 after sitting outside in this condition for 5 years.
Anyhow...hosed it down with semi-gloss black. And I had some tiger stripes. So I took the sheen off with a light scotchbrite rub and called it good. Reassembled and hooked everything up. And decided I liked the light under the dash that I'd used for photos earlier, so I added a white LED to the underside of the dash, aimed forwards so it was diffuse. It's switched with the ignition and really makes the interior look roomy.
I do have a new gauge hood on order. This one, again, has seen much abuse and suffered the ravages of time. It's not really attached at the front. I believe it also came out of that 1991 parts car.
The final result!
Miata nerds may notice the mix of door panel parts - speaker covers from a 1.6, but pulls from a later car. That's on purpose :) The glow on the gauges is from the oil pressure light.
Dropped the hardtop back on to take a look and I have to say I'm happy. The interior suits the exterior. It's nice enough to be inviting but it's clearly all business. I may still do something about the center tunnel, but not immediately.
So that wraps up most of the work. I'll start playing with that gauge cluster more now, so you're not all off the hook yet.
For those who are into those video things, I'm doing a FB Live presentation on the car at 2:00 PM Mountain on Jan 14th. That's tomorrow as I write this, your personal calendar may vary :) You can ask questions and listen to me ramble on about whatever crosses my mind. Bonus points if someone manages to get me talking about pressure differentials.
The two tone door handle spacers have to stay! I wouldn't have thought of that small detail, but touches like that are what takes the project over the top.
Keith Tanner said:As it turns out, I needed 6mm of spacer and that's 3mm acrylic. So this happened.
Too much? Maybe. I can always cut it out of black. We'll see how much it makes me smile.
That definitely makes me smile. A small detail that isn't noticeable at a distance, but ties to the exterior paint. Nicely done!
I like it! I think it strikes just the right balance between civility and business. The tunnel is the only thing that slightly misses the mark to me but I don't have a better idea. I'm sure the insulation is needed so you can't go down to the painted tunnel but carpet or upholstery doesn't quite seem like it would work either. It's not like the current approach is bad. I wouldn't have mentioned it if you hadn't.
I am open to ideas on the tunnel. I'm not sure I could take it down to bare metal even if I wanted to. Black carpet could be too dark, white would be filthy immediately, blue would be waaaay too much. I may be able to paint the insulation, I'll experiment with that a bit. But yeah, it's the weakest part at the moment.
Live video in 1 hour!
I don't know if I like this idea or not but how about a carbon fiber overlay? This is just carbon fiber fabric with resin brushed on.
On the tunnel? It would be an excellent troll.
ShawneeCreek (Forum Supporter) said:Keith Tanner said:As it turns out, I needed 6mm of spacer and that's 3mm acrylic. So this happened.
Too much? Maybe. I can always cut it out of black. We'll see how much it makes me smile.
That definitely makes me smile. A small detail that isn't noticeable at a distance, but ties to the exterior paint. Nicely done!
I like these door spacers a lot! Carbon overlay on the tunnel would probably be pretty durable and look cool ... well IMO.
I think the tunnel needs some Bargain Fiber (tm) in white and grey.
Keith Tanner said:On the tunnel? It would be an excellent troll.
Sometimes outside the box ideas are brilliant and sometimes they're just a reminder of why there's a box in the first place.
For the kids that do the YouTubes, here is the moving picture talkie version.
Don't mind the short wheel commercial at the start, that was me stalling for time so the live audience would have time to join and not miss the real intro to the subject. It literally only lasts for a minute.
APEowner said:Keith Tanner said:On the tunnel? It would be an excellent troll.
Sometimes outside the box ideas are brilliant and sometimes they're just a reminder of why there's a box in the first place.
You know, I can't really get it out of my head. Turns out that carbon fiber fabric is pretty cheap - just about the same price as blue suede headliner. Lay it over top, glop on some resin and giggle. Hmmmmm.
An aluminum tunnel cover that is painted to match the door cards?
Plus 1 for carbon over the tunnel. With blue threads?
I know you said you didn't want this, so tongue in check (mostly); white diamond pattern quilted vinyl. Would match the white of the interior, be something soft and maybe give a bit more heat & noise control.
Quilted vinyl just isn't my personal style. It's a good suggestion for a bunch of reasons, but I don't think it's for me.
I moved the car today so I could get the MG on the lift for a quick trans fluid check, and discovered that the tach isn't working and there is an exhaust leak on the driver's side that sounds like I didn't tighten a band clamp. Both easy to fix, but maybe that should take priority :)
On the lift, I don't see an exhaust leak. I may have to check while it's running.
I pulled code P0335 out of the car, which means a bad signal from the crank sensor. First, I found this. That thing grounds behind the intake manifold, I remember removing it. Obviously, I don't remember reinstalling it. Note - as tempting as it is, do not ground this to the fuel rail as it is moderately but not completely electrically isolated.
It seems very likely this is a contributor to my bad crank sensor signal. Traditionally, this is not a wireless connection.
The crank sensor is behind the starter which is behind the passenger side header. There's a rats nest back there with a lot of wiring going a lot of places. Header comes off, starter comes out. I had to quit working to eat before I got the header bolted up, so I haven't confirmed the fix yet. I cleaned up the heat shielding somewhat as well.
I obviously need to give the whole drivetrain a once-over before this is cleared for road testing. I did have to back the car out of the shop last night to get it on the lift and I'm really digging that LED interior light under the dash. We'll see if it's too bright when driving on the road, maybe I'll cut it down to half brightness when the lights are on.
APEowner said:I don't know if I like this idea or not but how about a carbon fiber overlay? This is just carbon fiber fabric with resin brushed on.
Do it do it do it do it! And the spacers are AWESOME!
Keith Tanner said:It seems like a reasonable test if you're trying to determine how furniture upholstery will age. Looks like I could pretty easily get the seats recovered in this without much concern. Won't tell us how the suede substitute deals with sweat, but at least it's pretty clear that it won't go threadbare.
FWIW, I used to work in the automotive seating world, and ingress/egress testing was normally a minimum of 250,000 cycles.
Keith Tanner said:On the lift, I don't see an exhaust leak. I may have to check while it's running.
You probably know this trick but if you can get someone to hold a shop rag over the tailpipe, or pipes while it's idling it's very easy to identify exhaust leaks. You'll want to use a real shop rag since it tends to get hot.
The one advantage to white Swain coating is that you can also see the soot buildup :)
I was parked right beside a metal workbench when I diagnosed the leak, I may have been mistaken. All the usual suspects (o2 sensors, clamps, etc) seem okay. I'll fire it up again and check with a rag to see if that shows anything.
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