The 'Things I build' thread

[sewlow]

News flash!
Sorry guys, but I don't own a GMT800! I have 2 GMT400's. Been pretty active for the last three years on GMT400.com.
I joined this forum so that I could offer advice & any tech help that anyone would need involving my area of expertise.
I do upholstery.
I also have a Bachelor's degree in Education, plus I'm a ticketed A.M.E. (Aircraft Mechanical Engineer, under Federal Aviation Regulation's 27.853, with endorsements for various aircraft under that section of the F.A.R.'s)

Strange as it seems, I don't have a build thread over there on either of my trucks!
I bought & started the mods on my '98 before GMT400.com even existed. I've had that truck coming up to 9 years. At the time, recording the mods wasn't a priority. I took the truck in the direction I did simply for my own enjoyment. I figured that the finished project would stand on it's own merits. The truck has gone through various stages since I've owned it. It's still far from being done. More stuff is gonna be happening to it soon enough, in the form of an LS 6.0/4L80e w/EFILive swap. The V6 decided to puke out the intake manifold gaskets after 375,000km.'s, & I didn't catch it in time. Damn Vortec's! I'm gonna re-do the interior, too! Those builds I will record over there.
The '97 has no build thread. It will. I've just been lazy on that!
My personal projects tend to be slow builds. Why? It's a time management thing. I'm self-employed, & I do a lot of work on other people's projects. Sometimes I just don't have the time or the initiative to go work on my vehicles after working long stupid hours on someone else's. So, the only time that has been spent on the '97 has been maintenance. It's my DD. Got some ideas for some mods, but they'll have to wait a bit.
The '98 has been sitting for a few years with a dead 4.3. The LS swap is gonna be such a big difference! From maybe 150hp to a butt-clenching 400hp+! Giddyup!

My '98.
4.3 (Dead!) 4L60e.
4/7 drop. Custom frame notch, boxed frame, relocated rear upper shock mounts, Belltech Street Performer shocks. 3.73 10b w/eaton posi.
Full urethane body & bushing kit. Aftermarket rear sway bar with custom mounts.
20x8.5, & 20x10 Boss 338's. 245/45 & 295/40's.
Custom Escalade seats, center & overhead consoles. 1200w Alpine stereo. (I'll get to that interior in a bit!)
Steel cowl hood & rollpan. Frenched L.plate front bumper. Street scene mirrors. (In the second pic, it has 454SS mirrors. Useless POS's!)
Coming soon...all new headlights, bumper & tail lights, complete interior re-do, body & paint work. (Still black, but in a 70* gloss. Think...Bumper black.)
I also have in my parts pile a rear disc system from a '95 Impala SS, which will be joined up with an SSBC big brake front kit, & Hydro-boost.
And (and!!!) the LS!
By the time it's done, the only original body panels will be the cab!

The day I got it.



As it sits, now.



My '97. The DD.
One year only color. Medium Bright Blue Metallic. Factory color matched mirrors.
4.3, NV3500 w/Hurst Comp.+ shifter (one of the best mods yet!)
'90/'91 bench with the flip down armrest.
2/4 drop. (I'll never do another one of those!) Doestch shocks (Poop! I'll get some of the Belltech's on it sooner or later.)
Rear sway bar from an Escalade. Has about 1/2 of a full urethane bushing kit installed.
NOS SS fogs & valance. Modded factory L.plate bracket.

In these pix, it's wearing the Boss wheels, 'cause I've been having a hard time getting 15" tires in the size & brand I want.



Perimeter security device.





The wheels it normally wears.



Seems I've run outa room for one post. Give me a bit & I'll get to the real purpose of this thread posted up.

 

[sewlow]

So, here's some of the reasons (excuses?) I've been so slack in even starting the threads on my trucks. Call it a journal of the projects I do for others, or a brag book! Whatever! Lol!
I've been doing upholstery since (cough!) September of 1979! In that time I've not only done auto interiors. I've hemmed jeans, fixed purses, tents, & bags for everything from windsurfers, to a whole Freightliner reefer, to boat tops & interiors! Kitchen chairs & nooks, antique chairs & couches, tonneau covers, & all the way to being lead-hand in a shop that did custom interiors in corporate jets. Had a Co. for 5 years that employed 13 women on sewing machines, & 4 or 5 assembly guys, manufacturing Hot tub covers. We produced 100-120 covers a day!
Mostly this is to keep from whoring up other member's threads, & a place I can continually post projects as they are completed.
A lot of these pix have been posted on that other forum before, but they are scattered throughout various threads. The ones I'm posting now, are the ones that I have on Photobucket. I'll add some that haven't been posted before as I find them in my computer. My open-pit filing system is not always the most efficient!
This is gonna be pic heavy.

This first project is the restoration of a front seat for a '59 Ford Retractable. 'Restoration' is the operative word, as I just don't 'recover' seats. I go through the whole seat. Nothing worse than having new seat skins, & a week later the track stops working. Or the owner is sitting 6" too low because of broken seat springs. I've got the seat already torn down, so might as well go through it all while the seat is on the bench. Besides, it's like building a house. If the foundation is questionable, how can the rest of the build be anything else but?
I'll show most of the project from start to finish. I say 'most' because I don't have pix of any of the spring/frame work. Taking pix of broken springs is a PITA! What I do to those is not always apparent in pix.

This is what I am starting with. This seat has been done before, as are most of the projects I work on. By the time they are this old, the interior has been done at least once, if not more times. And they are NOT always right. Some of these projects require a bunch of research to find out what is 'right'. Of course, I'm referring to 'restorations', where the interior has to be as the factory did it. I like to work within those confines.
One of the best compliments that I ever had was from one of my Sis's friends that I did a resto in a '70 Camaro for.
He said that it looked brand new, as it should. Like I'd never worked on it! Perfect! That's the way it should be.

This has obviously been done before. And not very well! The black lines are mine & they show how badly this seat really was done. The lines show the seams that are 'supposed' to line up with the pleats. Just how can people do such shoddy work like this & expect to get paid for it, too!





This is how I mark out the seat panels before I tear it apart. It's my own kinda code that I've developed over the years, which no-one else but myself would understand. It works for me, & I know exactly what's what at a glance. The arrows show the direction the vinyl has to go. Vinyl stretches one way, & not the other. The way the stretch goes is important when it comes to fit. Having the stretch go up & down helps to maintain the straightness of the seams.



Here's the parts marked & the cover torn down, ready to be laid out on the new material & cut-out. This process also includes line-up marks to I'll use when assembling the cover pieces.



Laying out the new material using the old piece as a pattern. Any flaws in the pattern will be addressed before I cut out the new piece.



I always use the passenger side as the pattern. It gets way less use & is usually in better shape. To make the driver side, or in the case of buckets, the whole driver seat, is made by making a mirror image of the passenger side.



Here you can see why the arrows are important.



New pieces cut out. They are for both sides of the seat. The new parts stay with the originals until time to sew them up. I keep everything pertaining to the seat until the job is finished & delivered to the customer. During the project, I'll refer back to the old ones continuously.





New sub-assemblies sewn. The backs, bands & the faces, less the inserts.



An explanation of the numbers in the following pic.
1st pleat=2.5"
then...pleats=1.5", 7X.
Followed by another 2.5" pleat.
18" wide.



Inserts laid out.



The inserts get 1/2" poly-foam.



Inserts/foam laid out on the backing material. This will hold the stitching on the backside & gives the inserts the dimensional feel.



The backing material gets tacked to the foam with a light dusting of glue. This about the only time I'll use canned glue.



Inserts sewn.



The shape of the new insert after being corrected from the originals.



The progression.



Old & new.



Inserts being sewn to the outer face parts.



Seams lined up with the pleats.



This is how I make sure that my line-up marks are perfectly aligned.



Faces & bands completed. Plus the back pieces too.

 

[sewlow]

Passenger backrest cover sewn & installed onto the frame. This is the initial fitting. With some finessing & some heat, the cover with fit better. There'll be no more wrinkles.



The cushion. Again, the initial fitting.



The completed seat. Check that inside top corner of the passenger seat & compare it to the previous pic of the initial fit.



So that's a basic overview of a seat restoration. Most of my projects follow the same basic procedure.
The following pix are of some of my other projects.
I don't always take pix of the whole process. Mostly before & after. I get concentrating on a job & don't always remember to take 'em.

Dodge truck seat.









The new bottom is not as shiny as the old original backrest due to the fact that the cushion has not been coated in armour-all. (yet! I have no control over what some people do to their seats once they leave my shop!)



'57 Retractable. Headliner, seats, carpets, trunk & trunk storage cover.











Seats for a square body Chevy truck. I learned this stitch from a leather clothing maker.
My part of this project truck has been put on hold till the dash is installed & all the wiring is completed.





I do a fair amount of convertible tops. 90% of all the tops are pre-made. For the cost of the raw material, I can buy a complete top already made. I have made them from scratch, though, when a pre-made top is unavailable.

'57 T-Bird Top.











The 'Hammer-on' binding not installed yet. That's what covers the staples.





More to come!

 

[bucket]

Seats for a square body Chevy truck. I learned this stitch from a leather clothing maker.
My part of this project truck has been put on hold till the dash is installed & all the wiring is completed.

Hey! These look like the seats I had asked you about, only difference is mine have adjustable headrests. And you know, I've also got crappy fabric and padding.

 

[sewlow]

Wow! Too funny! These had headrests. Owner didn't want 'em. They're still around her somewhere!
Haven't forgot about you. This is mostly a reposting of a thread on another forum, so it didn't take me too long.
I will get back to you via P.M. by the weekend!

 

[Old77]

As I've told you before I love your upholstery work! I need to come up and learn a thing or two from you. I'd love to do that level of interior work.

I also love your trucks Very nice and clean :waytogo:

 

[sewlow]

A couple of projects for me.
A hand-stitched leather covered shift knob for the '98.



Leather shift boot.



The seats & console in my '98.
Before. (and after a good scrubbing!)





After.
There are 5 different vinyls in these. Red, red perforated, grey, grey perforated, & graphite for the piping.
The console is vinyl covered, NOT dyed!





Bike seats. (Not mine!)





Check the 'fade' on the piping & the flames. Done with an air brush & dye before being sewn into the seat.



'35 Ford coupe hot-rod dash. I have the rest of the interior build pix somewhere. I'll post 'em when I find 'em!

 

[sewlow]

Complete interior for a custom '56 F-100. 392 Hemi powered! This is the fourth of 5 interiors I've done for this customer.
This is the original seat. Used to look like it came from a school bus. This is where the experience of aircraft interiors comes into play. Without that background, I never could of turned the seat into this.



The headliner. From scratch! There is no patterns for stuff like this. I make it up as I go along!



What's under the hood.



Check the 5th. line from the bottom.





http://www.gmt400.com/forum/showthre...ghlight=famous

 

[Old77]

A couple of projects for me.
A hand-stitched leather covered shift knob for the '98.

WOAH!! How much would you charge to make me one of these for my '98 but with gray stitching rather than red??? I'd like to have one for my trans shift knob as well as my 4x4 shift on the floor if you'd be willing.

 

[sewlow]

This is one of my Dad's cars. A '52 Chevy hardtop. He bought it brand new when he was 18! I grew up in the backseat! Through the mid-60's to the late '70's, it was his winter beater. An absolutely unstoppable tank in the snow! In the late '90's, after sitting for many years, Dad decided to restore it. The beginning of the nightmare. The resto was to take 3 years. In 5 years, it had gone to 3 different body men. The first guy had the car for 2 years. For the $2500.00 that the ole man gave him, all he had done was take off the front bumper, & remove the front windshield in that time. The second guy was supposed to femove the body from the frame & fab new body mounts. All he did in a year was to wrap the old body mounts in tin, then give 'em a coat of bedliner. (Like the ole man wouldn't notice that!) Body man #3 was the right guy, but it still took him over 2 years to finish the job. It then took me & Dad another 2 years for the final assembly. We rebuilt the engine, trans, & the rear-end during that time. Completely re-wired from front to back. I took on the job of polishing all the stainless. A bigger job than what I figured! As you check out the pix, look at all the stainless this thing is wearing! All this time that the car was being restored, Dad always said, "It's just a driver! It'll never be judged!" My opinion was, "Dad, how many times are we gonna restore this? Let's do it once. Let's do it right!" Don't know how many times I had to slap him upside the head with that before he got it! But, it was worth it! In 2011, The Vintage Car Club of Canada, voted it the best newly restored car in Canada for that year! But it ended up costing the ole man about 2X as much as what the car is actually worth!



The door panels had been done before. And done wrong! There's supposed to be pleats in them. But where? Over a 1 year period, I searched out & hunted down several other '52 Chevy hardtops just to get some pix & measurements of original door panels. Not a lot of those around, let alone the few that had original door panels. That grumpy old guy said I was wasting my time. But I did manage to track down an unmolested set! Just for the measurements. 3 hours away in a car that was just days away from being sent to the crusher.

















The visor mounts had to be fabbed outa stainless. Only sedans came with the visors from the factory. Their roofline is wider across the windshield.

 

[sewlow]

'71 Challenger Convertible. Yea...It's got a Hemi! And (OMFG!!!) a stickshift! I'm a Chevy guy, but DAMN!
This top came out perfect! It had to be! This is a $150,000.00-$200,000.00 car!





Num-num-num!!!







Love the stripe!

 

[sewlow]

WOAH!! How much would you charge to make me one of these for my '98 but with gray stitching rather than red??? I'd like to have one for my trans shift knob as well as my 4x4 shift on the floor if you'd be willing.

PM sent!

 

[Old77]

Replied love these pics you post! Very cool

 

[sewlow]

Thanks!
I grew up in a critical household. Hated it at the time, but now I've got this perfection obsession thing going on. Doesn't matter if I already did 1000 different projects. I'm still only as good as the last one!

 

[sewlow]

Couple more bike seats. I like doing these. One of the first things I started doing. They're small, so it's just bench work. No crawling around inside vehicles. Way lighter than an electric bench seat!

This first series shows how I recover one. All new from the pan up.
I've already rough cut the foam to shape.





Shaping with a mini angle grinder.



Wrapped in 1/4" foam.



















-------------------------------------------------------------

 

[sewlow]

Continentals. Not Lincolns. From '58-'60 these were a separate vehicle from the Lincoln line.
'58's were the best design IMO. After the '58's, Ford watered down the design.
This is a '58. \/.

A '60. Same owner.

These are the door panels that were in the car. Actually still on the doors! Like this! The rest of the parts for the doors, & most of the rest of the interior was in the trunk, in basically the same condition, or scattered through out the various boxes that were in the box of a '40's IH that was bought at the same time.

Stainless polished & new leather for the armrests. Test fit. Still have some smaller parts to paint black.

Passenger D/P.

And repeat.

Test.

Rear interior 1/4's. Before.

After.

When I do resto's, I've been told that I'm slow. (Bitch, bitch, bitch. Wawa-waaaa! Shadup! Just wait for it!)
This is why it's take so long. This is why that time is worth it. Everything is bagged & tagged, labeled, recorded & catalogued.
The time I spend doing that makes the assembly so much easier. Any customer that shows up with EVERY screw & fastener for the whole interior in a coffee can gets charged $$$! Taking stuff apart before bringing it to me is NOT saving them money!
I spend a lot of time making sure the final result is as close to perfect as I can possibly get it.
I go to sleep with numbers & measurements bouncing around in my head!



Yea, the corner closest to you got remedied. Door panel hardware was still at the platers.

KInda hard to see in this pic, but check how the seams/pleats, in the seats, line up with the arm rest & the 1/4 panel seam/pleat.
Door panel carpet to 1/4 panel carpet.

Top too. 2X! Mechanic working on the top switches, left a screwdriver in the top well somewhere. The rear window not only goes up & down when lowering the top, but there's a center section that can go up & down separately from the top being raised/lowered.
THAT's what got broken! The screwdriver was in the track on top of the switch. When the window went down to lower the top, the switch was triggered too soon. Things got seriously messed up after that. Mechanic (old, old fart!) couldn't get it to stop. By the time he got to the battery, the window had shattered, the window frame twisted, & the top shredded. Good thing that that wasn't my screwdriver they found in there!
Where the hell do you find parts like that? Not a lot were built in the first place.
Took them 6 months before it was all back together.
These guys send me a lot of work. This was one of their customer's cars. All the top damages came outa their pockets. None of this had anything to do with me. I told them to buy a top. And beer. With their help, we had the top done in a Sunday afternoon.

 

[sewlow]

'28 Model A RPU. (Roadster Pick-up)
Right top, right car. Wrong top frame! For time I spent modding the top to fit, it woulda been cheaper to have me make one from scratch.

New straps.

Pads & Rear window on.

Outer pieces on. The wrinkle on the right will come out.