So I got some time to keep plugging away at getting interior parts ready. I'm reusing everything except the headliner, plastic upper dash panel, and t top plastic pieces, so I'm putting in lots of work to get everything looking good. I was able to use plastic weld to fill in some cracks in a couple parts. I also grafted in a missing chunk on a top part using the material from my old upper dash panel and plastic weld. I'm repaining all the plastic parts with the interior paint from G Body Parts. I ordered 3 cans, and it looks like I will have a little left over when I'm done. Before I started doing this, I remembered how I tried to paint the parts in my '68 GS way back and it turned out real bad. The plastic underneath was dry and flaked off. So I took a spare part and tried an idea. It works great! Here is what I did:
Take a red scotch brite pad and sand the pieces. All the dry plastic on top comes right off. It's kind of like exfoliating the dead material right off. Here are the worst panels I had after sanding:
Blow it off with air, wipe it down with a wet cloth, and prep with rubbing alcohol. Here they are prepped:
Then I layed down a coat of adhesion promoter followed by 3 coats of the interior paint. Here is the finished product. The picture doesn't do them justice:
Here is what I got painted so far. All I have left are my kick panels and 3rd brake light. I will rub them all down with a little polising compound before installing them. That will take out any roughness and make them all look like they just got hit with a shine / protectant spray.
I was lucky enough to clean up the vinyl parts real nice. I used a baking soda / water paste with a little dish soap and an exfoliating glove to scrub everything clean. The dash / center console game out pretty good. I just finished the armrests tonight. Here they are: