The last place we left off regarding the homemade door panels for the Dodge was with the cutting of the final base panel that would be used for holding the skin that would be put on the boards. Holes were cut for the armrest mounting holes and door latch and window crank knob, along with the corners to match the contours of the door shell. I just had to find the right material for these panels. Since I planned on making the car blacked out inside, it only fit that I make the door panels be black, but what material would be appropriate? I decided on a vinyl material as many interiors on these old cars were made of vinyl. I ended up having to go to Hobby Lobby to find a large selection of different colored vinyl in rolls approximately 3ft wide. They sold the sheets by the yard and in the case of the vinyl I picked, it was $10 a yard. I picked a black sheet that had the plain vinyl pattern with no fancy designs stamped into the material. This would fit perfectly with a car door panel. With the measurements of the door panels, one yard was more than enough to supply me with the material to completely cover the panels with some overlap. This would be perfect as I would want to be able to glue the overlapping material behind the boards to get a better overall look and better adhesion where the chances of peeling back are minimized. At this point I had to lay out the sheet vinyl and put the panels down so I can cut out the individual sheets for each panel. Once that was done it was time to spray the adhesive down. I went with Permatex spray adhesive for car headliners and other interior materials. This stuff has to be sprayed onto the surfaces to be glued and allowed to sit for 5 minutes to partially dry before actually pressing the materials together. Before spraying the glue down I had to lay the vinyl sheet on the board and work the creases out of the material so when I start pressing the sheet onto the sticky surface of the glue on the board, the creases won't hold afterward, ruining the work. Once the creases were worked out of the vinyl I sprayed a liberal amount of adhesive onto the board, the side that would be considered the outside, and let it sit as per the instructions. Once that time passed I laid the vinyl sheet, outside end down, then got the edges lined up with the edge of the panel and slowly rolled the vinyl onto the sticky panel, getting the inside of the vinyl sheet laid onto the glue. I carefully worked the sheet across, making sure the material was laid perfectly flat on the board's surface, working further down the board laying more material down, repeating the same thing gradually every couple of inches until I finally had all of the vinyl inside end down on the glued surface of the board. I further worked the material to make sure no air bubbles were present and that the vinyl was crease free. With the panel glued to the vinyl sheet I flipped the works over and made several cuts at the corners on the overlapping material. These cuts were made where the corners are at diagonal angles or curves. Reason behind this is the cuts will create tabs that will more easily fold over to the backside of the panel, even when they overlap each other, making for a neater fold over when everything is glued down. Since this side of the panel isn't visible, it doesn't have to be aesthetically pleasing, just neat enough that there won't be a risk of any material pulling up later on. Excess overlapping vinyl material glued in place around the edges of panel #1. Note the extra adhesive still showing past the vinyl that's folded over. Also note how the material, being cut in several places, allowed for the material to be more easily folded over, even with overlapping over other vinyl material. I sprayed a narrow patch of adhesive along the edges of the panel and on the flaps/tabs of vinyl, letting it all sit for 5 minutes. Once the time lapsed I was able to fold the material over and easily press everything together to hold nicely on the panel board, completing the fold over of extra material. With the overlapping material addressed I was able to flip the panel back over and cut the material from the holes that were cut in the panel board to accommodate the door latches and other stuff on the door. With that done I moved on to panel #2. Of course panel #2 was pretty much a repeat of panel #1, with the exception that the experience gained from panel #1 allowed me to more quickly do panel #2. It was the same, aligning the panel board with the vinyl sheet then placing the vinyl in a way that allowed me to roll out the material onto the board once the adhesive was ready. Once the vinyl sheet was glued in place I flipped the panel over and made all the necessary cuts to the excess vinyl around the edges of the panel and sprayed the adhesive on a couple of sections at a time so I don't get overwhelmed trying to get all the flaps secured around the edges of the panel. Slow and steady wins the race here. With everything done I was able to cut the holes out on this panel as well. By the time I get around to drilling the holes in these panels to accommodate the screws and washers to mount them to the doors, the glue will have had plenty of time to set. As stated before, the holes will be positioned in the corners and the middle, in a way to try and make everything look as "original" as possible. I'll try to have the holes be in the same position on both panels, especially where the middle holes will be at. I'm going to try and use smaller washers with a minimum of material sticking out, more than likely I'll spray black paint on the washers to help mask them so they don't contrast against the black vinyl material. I could've went through the extra hassle to try and match up the clip points on the door where I would've used the original panel clips to secure these panels to the door but because these are temporary and I plan on getting the stock panels that have their unique design for this car, there's no need to go through the extra legwork trying to make these panels fit like the originals. Now if I was unable to get replacement panels I would definitely be trying to add the panel clips since I would have to keep these panels in place. But either way it goes, this was an introduction to making some interior pieces for a car, using cheap materials readily available at any local hobby/craft store and hardware store. Really these panels were made for about $20 in materials all together. That's factoring in if I bought both panels, since one of the panels was a salvaged piece of wall paneling. If you can manage the same thing, then making a pair of door panels can cost you less than an average lunch.
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