In the mad scramble to get it Resin Racer done, I seem to be hopping around a bit (and neglecting the blog!)
There is a steering wheel, a windscreen and some pedal work, but for this update, I’ll chat about the interior only.
The bottom part of the hard tonneau is on the car. I’m pretty happy with how it came out. If used the diamond pattern in red leather , as with the doors, on the bottom of it. No one will ever really see it, but it finishes it nicely and I couldn’t think of a better way to do it.
The carpeting inside the cabin is pretty much done too. I’ve kept it fairly neutral and resisted the temptation to go ballistic with the red leather. The binding/edging vinyl is exactly the same colour as the carpet, which is probably a bit boring, but I was hesitant to introduce another colour. That said, I think the red leather and tan carpet makes a statement! The compound curves around the shift lever and hand brake makes for tricky carpeting on the tunnel. I was going to use the same tan vinyl that I used for binding and just stretch it over the curves, but then decided to go a bit avant garde and use the red instead! I dislike a big boot around the shifter and brake as per most replicas. I like to think this way I’m acknowledging the fact this is a beetle pan without actually using a boot.
I couldn’t help myself and did the lap belts too. They are 3 inch wide overkill I know. The shoulder component will have to wait until I can do the roll bar. They attach medially at the stock points on the tunnel (late beetles have them) and laterally onto brackets I fabricated. I tried to beef things up by using two bolts into the pan each side. Still, belts in a fibreglass kitcar is probably mostly lip service.
I decided not to do carpets below my feet, but just some rubber mats. They look the period part, will be easy to keep clean and shouldn’t move around too much. They should also assist with sound insulation. Dirty shoes on car mats is a pet peeve of mine.
Lastly, I also addressed the sills. They seem to be often overlooked in homebuilt cars. The actual 356 has a very impressive wide sill, so I at least wanted to have something similar. I commited a few days of experimentation with aluminium profiles and eventually came up with something that uses the real car as inspiration, but looks adequately bespoke and, more importantly, adequately finished.
