Steve's Winter Cleaning Pt. 1

[stevestevesteve]

Started working on my 1997 Eclipse GSX today. Used my garage heater I got from Santa the whole time (Kept it around 60ish)

During the summer, I acquired the interior from a White 99 GSX with 52xxx miles on it. You can see it if you go down a few blogs, someone is in the process of building it. I got everything except the dash/seats/seatbelts. Most of Gray interior in my car I swapped to Black. BUt its winter time, and the GSX is hibernating. So time to get some issues goals tackled.

What it looked like before I bought it.

Earlier today

Current Status of the Interior

YUCKY RUST!

Dirty Carpet...

Should I remove the sound deadening? Should I remove both the black and silver deadening? What should I replace it with?

As far as the rust goes, of course the rust spots on the floor will be ground down to bare metal, and then resprayed silver. All of the rusty brackets will be removed, sanded down, and either cleared or repainted.

Let me know what you guys think! Give me your thoughts, comments, hints, what I could do, what I should do. let me know!

I like this picture

 

[mikEclipse99]

i wish i could put my car away for winter but i have nothing else to drive. cant wait to see some updates though!

 

[jjrock5]

Good progress so far. I'd try to Fatmat some things while stuff is out.

Thats what Ill be doing at some point. Keep it up.

 

[stevestevesteve]

Nice, thanks jjrocks, I will look into "Fatmat". I will probably go with that. Unless someone else prefers something different. And yeah I chose to keep my car in the garage cause I'm only 17, so I can use my parents cars to go bomb around in.

 

[Bluefire16]

I am undergoing the same thing here in Michigan, tomorrow morning the oil gets changed, today was the cleaning day. But I am in search of some black parts as well... i had much more black then you had to start with though...but my car was carpet and not leather seat....

 

[knochgoon24]

I actually used a spray on truck bed liner on my floor boards. I DD my car all year and I tend to track a good bit of snow into my car during the winter (no garage). The liner does the trick and prevents further rusting.

 

[OK's best GSX]

You have a super clean car from what I saw in the last picture!
I have OCD when it comes to cleaning cars.
What I always do with the carpet is power wash it..
Just depends of how dirty the sound deadening is would always be the deciding factor on if I pulled it off or not.
The sound deadening is what holds all the nasty crap that you spill.

If you choose to take the sticky sound deadening up you can use a hair dryer if you don't have a heat gun... way cheaper than dry ice but it leaves some little bits that you have to hit with goof off.

 

[VTEC_THIS]

Now I know why you had a great Christmas, you're warm now! No more working on your car while wearing two coats, an extra pair of pants and still coming inside frozen!

The black interior should be really nice. Have fun with it and enjoy your warm garage!

 

[slowgsr]

for the rust on the floor, once you clean it up.. just brush on some tremclad thats as close to match as you can get it for colour, afterall your not going to see it after anyways.

what type of heater are you using? How cold is it there?

 

[stevestevesteve]

Here is a picture of my heater. I have a 2 car garage. (attached) one wall is insulated. I have a back door (bad seal) and of course a 2 car garage door (bad seal also). I keep it full blast for about 15 min. Then I can go out in the garage with a sweatshirt and sweatpants. But with my 500 watt lamp inside the car. I can work inside the car in just shorts, and a t-shirt. Oh and I also keep the thing on full blast about 90% of the time im out there working...

 

[motozachl]

use some POR15 is a good idea

 

[eclipsekid187]

yes POR15 turns any rust into metal if i remember correctly used it on my 1st gen when i first got it. Does wonders tho good luck with the interior swap/restoration. There is an excellent tech article on how to take old dull looking trim/dash/panel pieces into brand new looking parts. If you need help finding it or need pictures let me know cause i followed it exactly and my 95 looks like a 2005 and my 90tsi looks better than my 2nd gen just cause i was still learning when doing the 2g either way looks good and have fun in that garage im freezing my ass off in pittsburgh in my drafty garage.

 

[VTEC_THIS]

That's a really nice heater!

 

[pj91gsx]

be careful with those heaters. they cost me a an air hose, and my electrician an warm suit.

 

[Boiler2]

I took the sound deadener out for weight savings. 25 lbs total. FYI