We finally got the door panels finished for the Camaro.

This is what we started with when we got the car.

This is the new ABS door panel base. This is what we will build off of.

We needed to build some tweeter grilles for the tweeters in the door. I actually took the arm rest and traced it out on paper, I then downsized it to the size I wanted, while keeping the general look of the arm rest. I then made a plug out of 3/4″ mdf from which I did a combination of rabbeting and flush cut to get my template. I then transfered that over to ABS, used a round over on it and then inset studs to mount the grille to the panel. Once we had the grille trim all smoothed out I textured it and gave it a couple of coats of satin black and low luster clear to protect it. THEN, I took my template again and made another piece that will be mounted to the door panel. This will give the grille a “molded up” look to it, basically it will raise the tweeter grille up and make it look like it kinda grew out of the panel.

This shows the “riser” for the tweeter grille.

We also made a riser piece for the two edges of the top sections.

We then took 1/8″ landau foam and covered the three top sections, sanded the foam and we are all ready to go.

Then we wrapped each section separately.

We then started gluing each section to the door panel.

A bit of a closeup showing the rises between the sections.

Finished product. (I hate photographing black, never shows the color right……)

We made a bunch of progress on the Camaro this weekend.

When the car came in, the air ride tank, the solenoids and the compressors were all mounted to the floor with drywall screws. We welded up a frame work for the compressors and solenoids out of 1/2″ square tubing. We welded flat bar to the rack and then drilled and tapped them to mount everything to it. We bolted the tank to the floor and then the rack was bolted to the mounting tabs of the tank.

We then sprayed the rack with an epoxy coating from Eastwood, it’s “Satin Black Chassis Paint”

Next up was the amp rack. The car has some issues with the trunk sealing properly sometimes so we wanted to make sure that should water get into the trunk there was nothing there that would be damaged by water. Traditionally we would make the amp rack out of MDF but if water gets into the trunk, it won’t last very long. We took some more 1/2″ square tubing and welded up the amp rack and welded flat bar to mount the amps to it just like the air ride rack.

We then welded the top section of the rack and welded mounting tabs to it so it can be secured into the truk. Like the air ride rack, we sprayed it with the Eastwood Chassis Epoxy Paint.

The amp rack is bolted to the floor of the trunk using thread inserts and stainless bolts/washers.

We relocated the battery to the trunk. Using thread inserts we mounted the rack to the floor of the car. We then welded up a simple bracket that we mounted the Streetwires combo fuse block to, we then drilled and tapped the side of the battery rack to mount the combo block bracket.

Like all the other racks in the trunk, we coated them with the Eastwood Epoxy Chassis Paint. We mounted the heavy duty relays for the compressors out of the way behind the hinges. We also mounted the main ANL fuse for the cars electrical system for easy access.

We also started framing the subwoofer box between the rear seats. It will be housing two 8″ woofers that will be firing against the back seat sheet metal and will be ported out the bottom/front of the console/enclosure.

We got the Modo Innovations Electric Trunk Release kit installed (see our review of this product)

Got the stereo rack wired and mounted. As we always do, we used molex plugs on the power wires for easy servicing.

We were slammed the last week with a bunch of other projects at the shop so we didn’t get a ton done on the car but here is the progress.

Got the console almost finished, just have to modify the mounts for the console then Flock the storage compartment in it.

We got the wiring in the trunk all completed. We had to replace all the sockets, housings and everything in between.

We had to install a pin switch for the trunk but we didn’t want anything visible to detract away from the clean look we are going after. We took a small “micro” switch and built a ABS mounting plate for it so that when the trunk hinge is closed all the way it makes contact, if the trunk opens as little as 1/8″ it will trigger the alarm.

We also started to layup the fiberglass for the subwoofer enclosure/console for between the rear bucket seats.

We are having some custom LS2 emblems for thee Camaro, here is the initial raw aluminum emblem base. There will be a black insert set into the chrome aluminum and it will be raised about 1/16″ higher then the aluminum.

We are doing a basic, well not so basic but a basic system in the Camaro. The source side of the system consists of the Sony CDX-F50 Marine deck, a 10 disc changer, iPod module and the Sony Marine controller. Everything but the iPod and the controller will be mounted in the trunk. We will be also using Morel speakers and Zapco amplifiers in it. The only undetermined product will be which subwoofers to use. We were going to use the Focal 5″ (4) because of the space between the rear seats but not that we modded the shit out of the seat we actually gain about another 4 inches in the center, so we might squeeze a single 10″ or 2 8″ in there. It has to be loud (convertible) and play all kinds of music.

Anyways, here is the trunk rack we welded up to hold the deck, changer, multichanger module and have a place to strap up the excess cables.

The car also had a GTO console in it……………..I can’t even really describe what the guy did to it………….anyways, it had to be fixed.

Before (yes, that is carpet wrapped around the front, and yes it looked like he trimmed it with a sawzall…………….

The console didn’t fit right, it was to wide, it was digging into the seats and damaging the leather. We took the console and cut 1.5″ out of the center of the entire console.

We then used pieces of ABS and riveted the whole thing back together, we then molded everything together. (see how the top trim curves up to where the dash would be in a GTO)

We then added to the front of the console to round it off and modified the trim panel to flow with the new front instead of “up” like it did.

We removed the power window switches from the doors and rear panels and placed them in the console.

With it almost finished we wanted to get some pictures of it. The two small holes are for the door pop switches. The large hole is for the Sony marine controller. The client really liked the silver accent that came on the console to begin with, so we kept it. We still have to clear coat the console and flock the storage compartment but it’s almost done.

The car came in with 2006 GTO leather seats (as well as many other GTO parts). The person that installed them used some back straps and some drywall anchors to hold them in. The seats had this large “hoop” section on top that the head rests sunk into. This “hoop” actually stopped the top from folding down properly. We took the seat apart and removed the “hoop” and redid the leather on the seat. We also modified the entire metal frame so that we could mount the solidly. We also removed the center section to allow for the future home of the subwoofers. By modifying the metal frame we got the seats lower, back and created more of a gap for the future woofers.

Before

After

When the car arrived, the rear side panels were really hurting…….they were made up of 3 seperate secured with several visible chrome screws.

Before

Doing some panel repair as we join all three panels together and then adding the speaker mount.

We then covered it with fleece and fiberglassed it, did some sanding, filling and shaping. We want to do something else on it so that it isn’t just a big molded vinyl panel. We will probably add some billet inserts or something to match the theme of the car.

The building of the custom door panels.

Before

After (well the beginning of them)