my thoughts are yeah i am doing this as well. along with all the plastic polished it should look pretty classy. do iiit!!!

 

The shifter bezel looks great! That deserves a thread all its own

 

So Bleedspeed how would you go about prepping the wood trim for paint? I tried to sand and refinish an extra set i have it even though my original pieces are a bit sun faded they still looks a little better than the refinished ones. I'll post some pics when I get home later. But yeah i'm very interested in doing this if i can get some solid advice on how to execute this. LMK
Bleedspeed, Here's those pics I told you about earlier:
As you can clearly see the finish is sort of orange peeled

And in this the middle one is the guinea pig oh forgot to mention the middle is 92 and the others are 95:

And finally this one :

Yeah the only thing thats wood grain is on the dash and doors, unless you have a wood steeringwheel, shifter **** and maybe a few other pieces i dont see the harm in taking it away as long as its done in a tasteful manner something classy and a deep high gloss absolute black I think would be very classy. What do you think?

 

hey socal just caught up with this. your photos died before i got to see them. but if you had orange peel could be a few different reasons. either it was too hot while it was drying or you sprayed it too thick. or both. im no pro painter but what i was thinking is this autozone now sells automotive paint by the quart. so i was going to try and get some glossy black and brush it on. doing about 3 coats or so would make it thick enough to wetsand out the brush marks. use a 3 step sanding method like say from 320 grit to 600 to 2000 grit. after the 2000 its time for rubbing compound (i like meguires) then a polishing compound then wax them for final protection. for the prepping i would sand them down to a pretty smooth finish going from 320 grit to 400. 320 is pretty aggressive for getting through most of the old clear coat. primer is not a bad idea either. its all about thin coats of paint and not being too hot or humid outside. if you still get some orange peel the sanding will solve that real quick. you can use shaker can paint like this too. but you have to spray really thin just misting it with a lot of coats and enough dry time in between coats. im not sure when i will get to this project but you can bet i will post up pics of painting the wood trim and polishing the plastic.

 

Not sure what happened i'll check with photobucket and try to repost. Its been cold and raining out here in California so its probably the cause of the orange peel well that and my heavy finger The door panel pieces are a piece of cake to remove , but I was told from CL member "mitsuguy" that in order to remove the dash panels you have to remove the entire dash to get to the 8mm's on the back side not sure if I want to do all that. you know of any other way of doing this? By the way cant wait to see those sub enclosure pics this weekend.

 

early update! i have made the square hole round...

here are the clearance pics as requested. about an inch give or take. if i make the enclosure which i probably will the bottom piece will have to be 1/2" mdf. and then from the inside of the enclosure i will put a few layers of glass on the bottom to stiffen it. because 1/2" will flex i checked it.


and here is the sub today. i had to remake the mounting ring because i had positioned it too close to the seat to fit an aftermarket round grill. but it came out better 2nd time around anyway.

 

Wow its coming along nicely! Theres plenty of clearance for that to work do you think a Alpine Type-R 10 would work? I have a set of 10's/12's wasnt sure which I was going to put in the trunk do you know the dimensions(depth) of the pioneer your using? Oh those other pics I told you about earlier are corrupted or something dont know what happened heres one its a little out of focus but you get the idea:

Cant wait to see this finished it should sound really good when you button it all up!

 

socal just looks like you needed to wetsand and buff those pieces. is that just a clear coat? because clear tends to orange peel worse then black. and cold will cause it too. mounting depth of the pioneer sub is 5 1/2'' sure the alpine will work. just about any 10" sub would work unless its some comp series with a huge magnet. but thats the beauty of the mounting ring you can raise it to whatever clearance you need.

 

The one on the right is the original and the other is the refinish and yes I just sanded the clear off and resprayed with a clear polyurethane made by Minwax. should I have used an automotive clear coat or some other type? So ok cool the alpine will work thats good to hear. You dont think since your going to be doing your trim pieces in black that you would also do the rear deck you glassed in a gloss black also? I dont know just a thought. I think if I do this setup that I will either paint it or wrap in suede to match the rest of the suede i'm currently having installed. What are your thoughts on this?

 

Maybe a shallow kicker would be nice for this project or I think another company makes a nice shallow sub can't remember.

 

a shallow mount would have gone in without modification. but the problem is they sound like crap. the whole point of the mod is to get a standard sub in there and save the trunk while having a sub facing into the cab to make it louder then a trunk mounted 10". oh and just to see if i could do it

 

alright she is buttoned up for now. i had to get my interior back in. there are still some details. but its good for now. in 2 weeks it will get an enclosure. the box design is too good to pass up! anyhow here are the progress pics.
test fitting.

primered.

foam going on.



vinyl going on.


grill fitment.

and the sub grill construction.




and the mostly finished product.



well thats it for now. the damn sub grill is just held on by velcro for temporary long story on that. but a few other details and the enclosure are left to do so expect more in a few weeks.
ps. socal72 yeah for sure use automotive grade clear! the shaker can clear will never look right. just get a quart at autozone brush it on and use a 3 step wetsanding process to remove the brush strokes then compound and buff. laters guys.
edit:god those phone pics suck.. sorry i really need a digital cam. the vinyl came out pretty good for my first attempt at upholstering. good enough to keep me happy until i rip it off and redo it with a slightly thinner foam

 

I think this setup to say the least is WINNING!...LOL AND thanks again for the tips on on the trim. I'll be checking back with you when you update again on the sub enclosure and i'll probably PM you on another matter.

 

Thanks for the interest in helping me ! I build track cars this kind of stuff is totally out of my skill set. Anyway I'll post a picture Monday night since the car is sitting down at my summer house.

 

Alot of work.. hopefully it pays off, looks great so far!