Holden HX Overlander Panelvan

Looking good so far.

Hey guys, not much of an update, but more of a sneak peek of what I'm attempting...


Got the E6000 spray glue in last night...works great! Sets up much faster than the gorilla glue and no need for clamps! Applied it with a brush to the foam and leather, pressed it together for about one minute with my fingers and it held on pretty strong! Dried in about 1-2 hours! Sweet! 


Decided to go a different route from painting the foam...lol! Picked up some soft sheepskin leather (about 0.8mm thick), also picked up some leather dye, tan for the front and white for the couches and wall panels in the rear! 


This is uncharted virgin territory for me, so hoping that there's a lot less 'oh shite!' moments and more 'Hell Yeah!' ones in the next coupla days...lol.


Anywho...some pics of the test subjects ... The piece on the right I used the gorilla glue but had to clamp it in order to bond...


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[img][/img]Getting there with the bucket seats.....taking longer than I thought...just need some fine tuning a bit, although I think that the leather is gonna hide most of the imperfections of the foam...I hope...lol!
Will start on the couches tomorrow.....as well as try to figure out the amount of leather required for the buckets. If I could determine that, I will start the dyeing process as well...


Some pics...

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Hey guys...this is how I'm doing the patterns ....I'm using gaffers tape (I think that's what it's called. It's kinda low tack so won't damaged the foam). I'm hoping that I can get the leather cut like this and bonded properly to the foam.
Lol...it actually looks pretty good with the tape on the foam...!  Notice how it completely hides all the defects or faults in my filing and sanding? Lol....!


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I thought the foam work was impressive, untill a saw you were making your own covers for them and WOW!!!
THAT IS WAY IMPRESSIVE mate,

DeeCee wrote: I thought the foam work was impressive, untill a saw you were making your own covers for them and WOW!!!
THAT IS WAY IMPRESSIVE mate,  

Hey thanks DeeCee! Lol!  Gonna be using sheepskin leather that will be dyed tan..can't have a sandman without leather bucket seats now...! Lol!
Hoping it all works out...building the arm rest / console now, then gonna start on the couches for the Shaggin interior...

Hey guys, the center console is about 90% done now....I tried to build it to scale based on pics, but because the tranny hump is a bit high to accommodate the transmission, the console will be sitting higher than it should. I will probably shave down the bottom of the console so it sits lower...


Anywho, some pics....not sure if the armrest will remain foam or if I will make it styrene ...

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[img][/img]Hey guys,
This is the piece that I tested the dye on. First time doing this, so it's a bit uneven, will try to get the piece for the bucket seats dyed more evenly...lol! The leather really sucks up this stuff fast, so need to move fast and try to keep it even when applying. I figure worst case, if it's not completely even, it will look like age wear on the seats.....it's a 30 year old car anyway...lol! 


Any who some pics, the small strip is the natural leather color for comparison...!


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Got a couple of days off work because of the extreme cold weather we are having...but no work=no pay...! 


So decided to suck it up and get the seats covered...


 I tried dyeing the one whole piece of leather that I cut off for the bucket seats, and made a big ole mess of it...apparently the way this dye works, is that you have to cover the entire piece in one go, in order to get an even shade. If you stop to load up some more dye, you see the line where you left off on the previous load....if you try to overlap in order to blend it in, the previous area only gets deeper, enhancing the difference...:banghead:
Since this fiasco I been hedging from working on them...


So the plan is to cut some more leather in to manageable sizes (enough for several pieces of the patterns) maybe 5-6" square, get them dyed and then start cutting the pieces...I may be able to salvage / select some pieces from the messed up piece as well...


In the meantime, just to get my mind off it, I took a few pics of the seats and dashboard and of the re-assembled front clip..


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First pic....my epic fail from a couple days ago... I used the foam brush but for some reason it left a lot of lines...same brush I used on the test piece I did earlier on...


Second pic..  I could work with this....lol! This time I used the kitchen sponge...lol...the dye is water based so if I rinse it out, I can stick it back in the bottom of the pack of sponges and go  lol...!


Just need to wait for the pieces to dry out and then start cutting out the patterns...


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Managed to make a little progress on the seats today...really slow going...took all afternoon just to do this...gonna be busy all weekend trying to get these done...lol!

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Hey guys, this is as far as I got tonight...taking a lot of time to do each piece as I don't wanna make a mistake that will show....still need to figure out how I'm gonna cover the bottom of the seat portion...may have to do a new pattern for that area...will continue tomorrow as much as I can.....

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COOL i like what you have done with the leather mate, taking your time is really paying off i think.

Hey thanks DeeCee!
Made some more progress last night...!

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Couldn't resist.....

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Jezz that's looking the part,great job on it.

Thanks Allan !

Been working on the rear interior as well...getting there slowly...lol!

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That is looking so RIGHT mate, your doing a great job.

Hey thanks DeeCee! 
Got the side panels and the headliner panel made...just need to glue in some magnets to hold them in place and once they are all lined up properly, start cutting the leather and start the dyeing process....!
Ignore the center brace, that's just to force the panels to stay in place to take the pics...lol!

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Hey guys...got a small update...!

Got the magnets installed for the wall panels...turned out a lot easier than I anticipated...! I lucked out with the magnets fitting in one of the extra tubing that I picked up for the dash...so encasing these tiny magnets in styrene turned out pretty easy...

Once I dialed in where the wall panels should go, I realized that the wall panels will also support the headliner, so no need to install magnets in the headliner!
So tomorrow I will start making the patterns for the seats, wall panels and headliner, then start looking at cutting and dyeing the leather....


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Nice work mate, but a question?? why magnets and not glue??

Ohhh....thought I mentioned it...lol..!  I really like the stock look of the tray so want to keep it, but also want a Shaggin interior...lol ! Using magnets will allow me to remove the interior including the shag flooring which is hinged to be able to pass through the tail gate! Lol!

Hey guys...got the leather dyed....! ^_^.  
That's just the raw dye on the leather....its dried out now, so I just applied the carnuba treatment to seal in the dye so tomorrow morning I will give it a buffing then take a couple more pics before I head in to work...
It came out pretty good I think...a few slight blemishes that I think will only show up with a very bright light, maybe....lol!  If you compare it to the flooring next to the pieces, I think it looks passable...!  Tomorrow night I will try to start covering the seats and the panels....

Anywho ....here's a pic of it before I applied the carnuba treatment...

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Hey guys, finally finished the seat for the rear interior! Also got the wall panels and the headliner covered. None of it is permanently installed as yet, it's just mocked up for now! Still need to do some detailing on the seats where you see the cuts in the corners, gonna try to run some piping in those areas...

Some pics...

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