January 20, 2002: Interior fun...

  • Today was a good day, sort of... I decided to take a break from the mechanicals and work on the inside of the car for a change. I have several things to wrap up inside there, so it was a good (ie: rainy) day for it! :)

  • The first thing I wanted to do was fix my parking lights. Unfortunately, they were only working in the parking light position, and were going off in the headlight position. I figured I was going to have to replace the Painless Wiring GM switch I had with a stock Camaro unit, but I was wrong. Thankfully, the switch has 2 possible positions for the parking light wires to attach. One does the above, while the other works correctly. I confirmed this by doing continuity checks on the switch, and sure enough, moving the wire within the headlight switch connector to the correct position did the trick! Woo hoo, something easy for a change!!! :)
  • While I had the gauge cluster out, I wanted to work on the speedometer. It was WAY off, and I assumed I had wired it wrong. Well, I was right. I had it all wired wrong! :-\ I changed the input to the correct terminal, hooked up the 2 missing ground wires, and added the calibration switch. When I was all done, nothing. :( Crap, not sure what's wrong, but I'll be calling Autometer tomorrow...
  • Next was the console. It has been sitting in the car for a while, but I've never bothered to 'mount' it. So today, I did! :) I managed to drill a few holes in the box area and screwed it to the tunnel floor. Worked great! Then I put together the box/arm rest and mounted it as well. I must say, it looks pretty good in there! :) I'm glad I decided to go with the original 73+ style console though, as I really like it better than the 70-72 plastic unit.
  • Then came the power window switches. I had run the wires all to the console, and I purchased a cool pair of billet aluminum switches from a Hot Rod company called Watson's Streetworks. I don't have any pictures of these, yet, but they are a nice piece! They come with 4 40-amp relays, wiring, the switches, and an aluminum mounting plate. I mounted the relays under the console since I had already run the main wires from the window motors there. Then I ran power and ground wires to the relays which are always hot so I can run the windows without the car being on. Finally I wired in the switches to the relays, and gave them a test! Ta da! It worked! :) I will mount the switches later when I make my cover for the shifter opening...
  • The bummer news is that my FAST ECU is not going to fit under the console like I had planned. There just isn't any room under there. I still have to mount my Vintage Air AC controls in there, and the front of the console touches the tunnel, so it won't fit there. Hmm... Guess I'm back to mounting it behind the glove box door somewhere. There isn't a lot of metal in there to make a bracket and mount it to. I'll have to be creative! :)
  • That's about it for today. I'm planning to work on pulling the tranny this week sometime to find out why I have hydraulic fluid dripping from the bellhousing. :( Not a good sign... I'm also considering pulling off the exhaust and having the entire thing ceramic coated to protect it from the elements. Not sure on that one yet though... I'll also get the speedo fixed and hopefully wrap up some more of the interior.