1994 Corvette First Build

[dan45hk 10+ year member]

I know these are kind of out of order but I tend to go back and forth between these things. I put the new carpet back on in the hatch area. The holes were not there for the mounts where the removable top slides in for storage when its not on. I made a template for this. First I put the carpet on then pressed down where the two bolts are which made an indention in the rubber on the back side of the carpet, then used the awl to punch holes through the carpet. The template was placed over the screws sticking through. On the rear hatch area I couldn't find those round tab things that hold the carpet down so I used some 1/4 inch washers and M6-1.0 nuts. The carpet needs to be in for the final fit of the fiberglass box and the amp racks/false floor.

If you do begin to start glassing one of these is a must:

A syringe with a BLUNT tip needle helps measure the catalyst:

This is the new radiator in, don't get me started on installation of that thing, just know not to cut the shroud if it's a Dewitt's or you might end up with a gap:

 

[dan45hk 10+ year member]

Finished putting in most of the new carpet, still need to make the holes for the seat bolts.

Also here are some better pics of how the fleece looks glassed on the sides of the pods (which aren't close to being done by the way). Pods still need to be trimmed so the carpet can slide under them and fully enclosed in fiberglass, and hole made for the 6.5.

The hatch pics show how I'm trying to make the amps/box stealth (the carpet will just go over them and when I'm using the sub the right carpet flap just flips back.

Put in new hatch weatherstripping.

New window regulators will also be put in.

 

[dan45hk 10+ year member]

Here's a tip on putting on the plastic panels. I bought almost all new interior plastic panels and even when new if you turn the mounting screws just a little too much they will slip through the hole. This makes it difficult to have a tight rattle free fit. I found these fiber washers that work great, they prevent the screw from slipping through the hole, cushion the screw against the panel as they are semi-rigid and not metal, and you can't tell they're on there. I got them from Digikey, the part number is 3120K-ND.

These are the panels I just tried them on and they work well.

Getting back to the front speaker pods, I cut the back of them so the carpet can slide underneath. The next step is to hot glue fleece on the back from where I made the cut to the front and glass it.

 

[dan45hk 10+ year member]

Another tip when working with the covers off the doors is to use a piece of wire or paper clip to jump the hatch connector to be able to open the hatch (instead of dragging the door cover over to plug in the connector.

Finished routing the power wires and attaching them.

Having no room to mount the 4th crossover I placed it in the cubby hole (passenger side) where it does not interfere with the box.

The Avic Z1, which I upgraded to a Z3 has several antennas for Sirius/XM/ and GPS Navigation. Cars get broken into when these antennas are visible (usually mounted on the dash). So I placed them under the dash on a piece of metal which is attached to the AC ducts with heavy duty velcro. I did this a while ago (that's why the metal is rusted) and it works very well.

I routed the antenna wires down into the head unit compartment and out the side.

Also I routed the Mic on the drivers side pillar.

 

[MikeyB 5,000+ posts]

Looking good man.

 

[dan45hk 10+ year member]

I got most of the interior back in, everything fit fine except for the door panels, I had to remove the dampening on the outside of it. I also had to make a few adjustments here and there for various things but nothing major. Also I got the rest of the new weatherstripping in which was a lot easier than I expected. Next I'm going to finish the front speaker pods.

 

[dan45hk 10+ year member]

Here are the new pods I made out of 1/4 inch MDF. These were a lot easier to make than the fiberglass pods but they won't be sealed. I might make them again out of fiberglass if I'm not happy with how they sound.

 

[dan45hk 10+ year member]

I applied some Rage Gold body filler, then after sanding I'll spray on an adhesion promotor, primer, black acrylic paint, and the clear coat. If I get pinholes after sanding I'll use some Rage Xtreme that should get rid of the pinholes.

 

[dan45hk 10+ year member]

Here you go, I wet sanded the clear with 600, 1000, 1500, 2000 and then used my metabo with menzerna power gloss polish and an orange pad followed by menzerna intensive polish and ceramic polish with a blue pad. No wax yet as I have to wait 30-60 days but I'll use Pinnacle and that should make it shine even more.

Finally installed the box and woofer. You'll notice the woofer isn't centered, that's the only way it would fit . Also I am STILL waiting for woofersetc to send me back my Zapco amp which is supposed to be getting fixed. I'm refinishing the plastic interior dulso pieces and am about to have my Avic Z3 installed completely. There's a bit of a gap between the box and the wall behind the seats, it should fit flush so I need to move the wires around underneath it.

 

[dan45hk 10+ year member]

I refinished one interior piece with plasti-dip, the color is about 1 shade lighter than the Dulso coated piece I have. Also the texture is not as smooth as Dulso. However even side by side inside the car it's pretty hard to notice if you weren't looking for it. So if you want it to look exactly like Dulso then don't do this but if your interior pieces were as bad looking as mine and you don't want to fork out hundreds of dollars to just have them start peeling again in a few years you might want to consider this, here are the pics:

Plasti-dip is on the left, Dulso on the right:

Plasti-dip texture

Dulso texture

Close up side by side, Plasti-dip on left

 

[dan45hk 10+ year member]

I'm in the middle of refinishing some interior Dulso coated pieces and had to pull out the heater blend door motor since it went bad. I had to pull back the insulation (the luxury liner) just at the foot area of the passenger side. I've been driving around and the noise level inside the car has gone down dramatically, actually a lot more than I expected. However what really made me notice the difference is after I removed that piece of insulation for the blend motor. I could hear exhaust and road noise coming out of that little area like it was a speaker. This project has really made an incredible difference, and the drone from the Magnaflow exhaust is gone. You can still hear the exhaust when you get on it though. It's not nearly like my Mercedes (and don't want it to be) but it's at the point now where it's much more comfortable to drive on long trips, there are no squeaks or rattles, and it's much cooler inside (my right leg doesn't get warm anymore from touching the transmission tunnel). I still have a little more insulation to do on it, I'm going to apply luxury liner to the inside of the wheel wells to cut down on tire/road noise and should have a pic of the interior completely finished as soon as I get that amp from woofersetc and refinish the interior pieces.

 

[BeAlLsTaR13 10+ year member]

looks really good, box looks really shiny

 

[dan45hk 10+ year member]

looks really good, box looks really shiny

Thanks, yeah I was surprised at how good the paint came out, I used Duplicolor Acrylic Lacquer base and clear.

 

[mcsoul 10+ year member]

Looks great. I see the rainbows in the back; but I can't figure out what

your doing in the front doors. What's going in the doors?

 

[dan45hk 10+ year member]

Looks great. I see the rainbows in the back; but I can't figure out whatyour doing in the front doors. What's going in the doors?

Rainbows are up front too they're in the kick panel area.