One thing I have learned with this build is that all projects lead back to one that has to be done at the head of a long line of projects. Right now, the one thing at the head of the stack for many projects is the headliner. That is holding up the front and back glass, the upper trim, the door weather stripping, the back interior panels, on to the carpet. So that’s what’s next.
I had to decide if I wanted to go with a one piece headliner, which is an after market and like a solid piece of plastic, or the original cloth headliner. While I would like the additional headroom the one piece provides, I don’t like the look. I am upgrading a lot of things, but they all have to have that classic feel. I like the ribbed cloth look of the original headliner.
Since it’s been over a year and a half since I have seen it with the original headliner, I couldn’t remember exactly what color it was. I have the sun visors though. Looking at them in the garage lighting, they look like fifty year old dingy white. I ordered the white headliner and set it next to the original sun visors. With that contrast, in better lighting, they are clearly a very light blue. Try again, and this time I have the light blue headliner and it looks much better. Hard to tell its blue. I was worried it would be some baby blue color and I would hate it, but its very subtle. Almost like white with a reflection of the rest of the blue in the car. I would probably call it more of a blue grey than light blue.
In the picture, the top is the light blue headliner, the bottom is the white. The visors are the original. Remember, my car is originally a 2B, two tone blue interior.
I plan on taking it to a local upholstery shop as a recommendation from my body shop as to how they usually do this. Trimcraft in Snohomish is also doing my seat assembly, and is well versed in this type of work. Apparently, they are the goto shop for the local restoration businesses as well.
Before I drop it off for the headliner install, I decided to add some sound deadening with Dynamat. I went for a pre-cut kit to save a bit of hassle.
I moved the original bows out of the way, and it was like sticking stamps on. Really big stamps. I also bought some insulation from NPD which is just thin batting. It’s up to Trimcraft if they use that as well or not. Along those same lines, I picked up sail panel insulation pads as well.
Things turned out really well. The flash from the camera really makes every little wrinkle show. In normal light you cant see any of the imperfections in the pictures. I am glad I went with the light blue. It’s more of a slight blue/grey, washed out to nearly white. It’s the color I never noticed, but it feels like I remember. With the headliner, Trimcraft also put in the parts that screw into the headliner: sun visors, mirror, and dome light.
This unlocks the front and back glass install, which I will be doing as soon as I get the rear trim polished.
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