Door Cards & Seat Belts

The car is getting its interior next week so it's been a rush to complete the jobs necessary to not need any further fabrication on the interior of the car.

First job was to make the door cards. This is made from 3mm plywood. First draw round the shape of the door and then cut the shape about 1/4" / 6 mm inside that line. Once done chamfer all rounded edges to 45 degrees.

The manual will tell you to drill 10mm holes but what it doesn't say is that the actual clip is offset to where you drill the door card so don't drill straight through the card and door (as I did). This will just mean throwing away the first door card and starting again :-)

The clips (Clip 260) is from Woolies Trim. Once attached to the door just add the door catch and check all is ok.

I found the passenger side to be more difficult that the drivers. The lip on the door is higher and needs sanding down otherwise the door lock will foul on the door rubber.

Also make sure you have plenty of P38 on the door lock metal brackets. If you go sparingly then the jolting of the door will make it break away and you'll have to re-set it from the beginning...guess how I know.....

The seat belts require bigger holes than you might think. The top mounting holes need to be big enough for the ring to screw right up to the mounting bracket and you will probably have to cut the bolt length down so that it doesn't foul on the body after it passes through the bracket. The lower bolts need around a 30-40 mm diameter hole. This is because the body does not sit well into the tub leaving a large gap from the body to the chassis. To ensure safety you will need to insert some spacers into the gap. You'll also need some long 50mm 7/16ths 8.8 High Tensile bolts to bridge the gap.

The door surrounds are simply screwed to the wooden blocks you have inserted. You can trim them just below the door wedges and just after the scuttle to get a better fit (Jon at AK advised he does this). Bolt or tie wrap them to the scuttle.

Finally, I have boxed in the wiring in the boot and the battery area to ensure nothing gets damaged when I have things in the boot. Once carpeted this should work pretty well although I will need to carry a small screw driver in case of the battery having an issue. I have just used spare 3mm ply and some 25mm * 15mm wood beading. The beading was sikaflex into place then the ply screwed to that to allow access if needed.