January 8, 2000

Despite many interruptions from life, I've managed to steal a hundred hours or so and work on the car.

Sandblasted the floor down to bare metal.  Brushed on the POR-15 paint, and laid in the carpet.  The substance on the rocker panels that I earlier thought was fiberglass turned out to be some sort of paint, so they came clean down to bare metal.  Amazingly, so far I've found no rust holes.  I now have only to install the new stereo, and the interior will be done.

My original plan was to use a Jensen in-dash CD player/receiver, but I heard too many bad reports.  So now I have a Pioneer DEH-P2000 on order, and Jensen speakers installed.  A 4"  pair to replace the factory setup, and a surface-mount pair on the rear deck.

My new console insert, made from oak plywood, really dresses up the interior.  The original was a bit tacky, if a bit stronger.  New column cap cowl, and the interior looks really good.

The hingees in the driver's door are trashed -- heads sheared off the pins, and the remainder stuck in the hinge itself.  The 4 hinges I received from Chris Bokhart turned out to all be for the passenger door.  So it's soak the old ones in oil, heat them up, beat the hell out of the pin with a sledge, and repeat.  I did get one to move about 1/4 inch today.

I also put it back on the ramps today, and started scraping the underside.  It seems the Marine Clean has been working on the undercoating -- it scraped right off!  So I sprayed some more areas; plenty of time for this.  There's a bit of damage from bottoming out, but nothing serious.  Same with the bent transmission mount, it would seem to be fine as it is.