New Paint, Upholstery, and a Name

[Gene Jenkins]

Sold the Chevette which made room in the garage to start on the Ford.

This is what I started with:

The gel coat was crazed quite badly and was generally dull. I gutted the interior. This is what the carpet looked like:

I think that it was originally brown. The carpet in the BMC Chevette faded to orange as well. I haven’t a clue where the blue, that was under the seat supports, came from.

I disassembled as much as I could, sanded and primed all the cracks in the fiberglass and gave the whole car a good sanding with 400 grit. I had it painted at Maaco and know they don’t have room in their pricing to do a lot of prep. Here is the car as it came back from the painter:

And this is where she got her name. My wife’s favorite movie is Gone With the Wind. So, what else but “Scarlett.”

I started putting her back together while the Auto Trim shop cut me a new carpet set and re-upholstered the seats in real leather. The leather cost $600 more than vinyl would have, but this is my wife’s toy and she doesn’t have many.

Just got her back together. May I introduce Scarlett:

 

[edward ericson]

Very nice, Gene. Love that interior.

[Larry Murphy]

 Great looking car, I love the color combination.Your love for the car and your wife clearly shows in the quality of the reconstruction.

[Paul Mossberg]

Beautiful.

Nice work Gene.

I admire you guys that take on restorations of old kits. I feel lucky to have built mine in when my kit manufacturer was so active and accessible.

Of course you guys have TDREPLICA.COM to rely on. I had nobody.

Paul Mossberg
Former Owner of a 1981 Classic Roadsters Ltd. Duchess (VW)
2005 Intermeccanica Roadster

If you own a TDr and are not in the Registry, please go to https://tdreplica.com/forums/topic/mg-td-replica-registry/ and register (you need to copy and paste the link)

[Mel Zeiger]

Beautiful job the car looks amazing

[Montie Henderson]

Great job!!!

[Mark Hendrickson]

Nice to meet you Scarlett! Now Larry’s not the only one with leather seats!

[James Cochran]

21 Thumb salute!

AWESOME job. Kudos! She’s a beauty. WOW. Outstanding!

I’ll be updating the registry tomorrow and I’ll get her name and color posted.

James

JasCochran40311.6954050926

[Richard Wobby]

Beautiful Job

A car that looks like that has to make you proud

[James Cochran]

Scarlett is now in the updated registry spreadsheet

[Paul Mossberg]

And on the alpha listing.

Paul Mossberg
Former Owner of a 1981 Classic Roadsters Ltd. Duchess (VW)
2005 Intermeccanica Roadster

If you own a TDr and are not in the Registry, please go to https://tdreplica.com/forums/topic/mg-td-replica-registry/ and register (you need to copy and paste the link)

[Gene Jenkins]

Thanks for all the kind words. One thing that I wanted to point out to anyone re-doing the upholstery. If you look closly at the pictures you will notice that the top 6 inches of the seat back has been narrowed to allow freedom of movement for the top bracket. This also allows the seat back to be adjusted forward and back without wearing or tearing the fabric. The old covering was pretty beat up in that area. It didn’t cost any more to have that change made.

[James Cochran]

I hadn’t noticed that before. Great idea , thanks.

Looks like you have door restraining straps also, to keep the door from banging the rear fender? Are the door panels leather also?

James

JasCochran40313.3483217593

[Gene Jenkins]

The door panels are the same leather. The straps were made out of the scraps that they gave me.

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