GTcarz - Automotive forums for cars & trucks. - Reupholstering Door Panels Tutorial

http://www.meissenation.com/driver_semi.jpg

Materials Needed:
4 feet by 4.5 feet vinyl (you'll have plenty extra for mistakes..)
DupliColor Vinyl & Fabric Color spray paint*
3m Spray Adhesive
5-Minute Epoxy

Tools Needed:
Needle Nose Pliers
Flat Blade Screw Driver
Phillips Screw Driver (Large & Small)
Hammer
Putty Knife

* The DupliColor Vinyl & Fabric Color paint is only needed if you plan to repaint the plastic pieces. If not, don't worry about it. :)

Removing Panels

First step is to remove the screws from the door panel. There's one square in the center of the panel with the power locks and window. The right side of the handle has the final screw for this piece. Pop out the power locks and window piece, and pull the plugs out. Usually a screw driver works best to get the plugs out, but be careful not to touch two plugs. :) Next are the three major screws holding the door panel on. There's two on the inside of the handle, and one beneath the screw previously taken out on the right of the handle. After these three screws are removed, I removed the piece covering the mount for the side mirrors. A single screw holds this on. After taking that piece off, simply pull up on the door panel and after some tugging and pulling it should finally come up and free. I broke a couple of the tabs on mine, but 5-minute epoxy fixes that.

Seperating the Panels From Eachother

Alright, now lay the door panel flat on a table or workbench. I used a putty knife to scrape the sound deadner / insulation away from the glue. I realized afterwards it would've been nice to have some DynoMat to replace the sound deadner with when you're putting it all back together. Since I wasn't replacing it, I carefully removed the insulation from the panel and the cardboard. Next I removed the window piece that is stapled to the top of the panel, simply take a flat blade screw driver to bend the staples away and needle nose pliers to straighten. Once all the staples are straight, use that flat blade to pry the pieces apart and viola it's ready to be reinstalled when you're done and the staples are still good to use. Now you can see great GM engineering at it's best. Melted tabs keep the panel together. Obviously NOT meant to be taken apart after it's put together! Now there's many ways of doing it, but I personally grabbed the putty knife and a hammer and just chisselled (spelling?) the melted portion off, leaving me clean knobs that are flush with the panels. I counted 34 but there's probably more there. In any case, once the melted tabs are off and it's flush, the cloth panels come right off.

Painting Plastic (Optional)

If you want to change the color of the plastic, this is the easiest time to do it. Note a well ventilated area is great to have, as my house smelled great (sarcasm) afterwards! Take some mineral spirits and wipe down all the plastic pieces to take all that armorall and other junk off to get down to the bare plastic. Let it dry, and then paint your heart away! I used DupliColor Vinyl & Fabric Color and it worked pretty good, was dry to touch within 15 minutes at most. To be safe, though, let it cure for 24 hours before putting the pieces back together as to not scratch the paint. I painted the main door panel, the power lock / window plastic panel, and the piece that goes over the mount for the side mirrors. It only took me one can, but I only needed one coat. Anyway, this was the easiest to do. Just some tips, though. Make sure you have a lot of light if you're not doing a major color change. Graphite to black was hard to tell the difference, and I ended up using a flash light to shine and check for unpainted areas. Also, it seems to work best to do short sprays while the panel is flat on the ground. We thought it'd work better upright, but too much of it ran.

Attaching Vinyl to Cloth Panels

This can be the most time consuming portion of the mod. We happened to have some 3M spray adhesive from a previous project. We had originally bought it at a Pool & Billiards Repair store, as we were using it to glue the felt to the bumpers and what not of a pool table. I'm sure it's available elsewhere, though. Anyway, so this stuff works really good and really fast. Trace an outline of your panels to be covered leaving about 2 inches extra all the way around the piece. Once it's all cut out, lay the vinyl face down on the work area. If you're using a nice table, definitely use some sort of blanket, cloth, newspaper, or whatever to cover the table because the spray will get everywhere. This next step depends on what you're covering. When my father and I covered the top portion, we layed the piece face down ontop of the vinyl. The easiest way to do this we found was to take the piece and tilt it so the edge of the clothed piece is pinned against the back of the vinyl. Spray the 3m adhesive onto the 2 inch extra vinyl and the cloth lip and plastic (depending on how much of a lip there is compared to the 2 inches of extra vinyl..). The 3m works by spraying both pieces to be bonded, let it sit for 1 to 10 minutes (or until tacky) and then firmly press the pieces together. We did it side by side, and it worked pretty good. Once the side is firmly pressed down, I used simple electrical tape to tape it down for extra measure. Let sit for a few minutes, and move on to the next side. Make sure you have a good utility knife handy to cut and trim the excess, especially around the corners. Also, make sure to apply a lot of tension when putting the last few sides together so the vinyl will be tight. Next, cover the cloth piece that runs along the bottom half of the panel. It's basically just cloth glued to cardboard. Copy what they did! Spray the cloth with the 3m spray, and then spray the back of the vinyl. Let stand for atleast a minute, or until tacky, and then apply it to the cloth. My father and I decided to keep the cloth on to add a little cushion to the pieces.

Final Steps

Now that the two pieces are covered, and the paint is nice and dry, gently place your pieces ontop of eachother to see the job! A great cheap mod, isn't it? Let the paint and adhesive cure for 24 hours for best results. To reattach the pieces together, we used 5 minute epoxy to glue the knobs back to the panels. If you have DynoMat or some good sound deadner, when you're putting it all back together it'd be a great time to use it! If not, go ahead and use that 3m spray and reattach the stock insulation. Installation of the door panel is the reverse order of taking it off, and you're done!

Pictures

http://www.meissenation.com/passenger_off1.JPG
http://www.meissenation.com/passenger_off2.jpg
http://www.meissenation.com/passenger.JPG
http://www.meissenation.com/driver.JPG
http://www.meissenation.com/passenger_interior.JPG