Okiee Dokiee.... I'm outta jail. Outta the horse'piddle(face is healin' up just fine). In spite of everything I did manage to get some stuff done yesterday.
I was under consoles pretty much all of yesterday. As you'll see I did the work in stages. It was between the stages while waiting for contact cement to flash off when I got into trouble. Last time I worked on the console area I nailed down the floor. Good thing I did. I was twistin' and turnin' pushin' and pulling. Hell at times I thought I was break dancing. Earlier, after installing the carpet in the floor area when I finished I stated I didn't know how it came out as far as position goes. Turns out it wasn't bad - but it also wasn't perfect. It did create some problems and did cause some of the seams to end up in the wrong place and visible. But... it is what it is and you'll see what it is when I start posting photos.
The start was easy enough. Stick the carpet to the vertical piece in front of the cooler....
I've not applied to contact cement in this photo. I have held it up. Made sure I could get it under the top cap @ cooler. I did have to do some trimming around the cooler to keep the carpet from puckerin' up but I expected to do that.
Now both surfaces have contact cement on'em.
And here it is stuck in place. You can see where the carpet runs along the cooler on the left hand side and why it required trimming....
Now... under the drivers side console. All told I probably spent 4 hours on this side alone. Cutting, trimming, fitting, checking, cutting....... And still it came out less that what I was shooting for. But it is what it is and it's ain't getting done over.
On this step I did only the foot trough or whatever'in'tha'hell you wanna call it. That little narrow opening that's only on the drivers side. It's virtually impossible to fold all the carpet back and out of the way to put contact cement down without it coming in contact with its-self. This is the reason I'm doing it in stages.
Contact cement is applied and waiting flash off....
Welllll... guess I didn't take any photos of that piece stuck in place. Not to fear.... it's visible in other photos later on.
Once that area was stuck down I then started prepping an fitting the section of carpet that goes over the "step" that exist on both sides of a 209 Gambler console. It was here.... actually it was when I got to the console area that I abandoned the great idea I was going to sand all the areas to enhance to adhesion of the carpet. As you can see in the next photo I started sanding. Sanded for about 1.5 seconds and said "screw this"... Put the sander away for the remainder of the job.
The white marking on the carpet backing is where I'll stop when applying contact cement to the carpet. I rolled it up the step and marked it where it begins to transition from horizontal to vertical up the wall.
At this point trimming/fitting has taken place no contact cement applied.
And now it has contact cement applied and you can see the area to be carpeted a little better.
Not much information here. Now it's stuck down but you can't see it for the overhanging carpet. But you can see a little of the foot trough area that was stuck down earlier.
And the side section nailed in place. As you can see it goes up under a lot of cabling(had to cut tie-wraps to get carpet out and will re-do once carpet is complete). Getting the carpet up under the wiring/cabling isn't all that hard as long as you don't coat it with contact cement. I was careful not to do that so the install went fairly smoothly... The taped wrapped wires visible on the RH side are connected to the foot trim switches and will be run around to the left hand side of the toe trough area when I start buttoning everything back up.
Two pieces left on the drivers side console area... And the next one was an absolute royal pain in the buddinski. If you look on the corner on the left hand side(outside corner) you can see where the seam will be. This seam existed with the original carpet but it was located around the corner so it wasn't visible. That is the result of the carpet not being positioned correctly when I nailed down the floor section. The shiny stuff you see in the back area is the epoxy I used to fill the holes where the fire extinguisher was located. I'm gonna put it back there but figured my chances of locating the same holes was pretty slim. I also epoxied up trim switch mounting hole, hot foot mounting holes, ect....
This is the piece, contact cement applied, that is going in there. I tried getting the original piece to fit but because of the shift in carpet position the original simply would not fit. I tried using the original as a template and made a couple of pieces that still didn't fit. Ended up making a cardboard template that did work after a few fitting/trimming sessions...
And this is the place it's going - contact cement applied.
Stuck in place... The seam is visible. It isn't horrible and would have be perfectly ok if it had been positioned on the inside like it was originally. I worked on that seam for awhile and I suppose I made it better than it was. If I know anything I know this - It ain't coming out for a do over!
I started to not even do this last piece. It's really not visible unless you don't put a piece of carpet there. Then it is visible - go figure. But for what it's worth. Here's what the drivers side looked like upon completion.
On to the passenger side....
It an identical process without the foot trough for the passengerside...
Contact cement applied waiting for flash off....
Guess I got lazy towards the end.... I didn't get photos of each step on the passenger side - 'least I can't locate them. Soooo... on the contact cement flashed off I completed the passenger side carpeting. Oh... I did clean off the side panel before installing carpet...
So... all that's left is the side panel on the drivers side and a small section on the rear deck.
Drivers side vertical panel... Cleaned and ready...
It was a bit of a pain to get the carpet installed with the livewell panel there. I ended up cutting one side of the carpet such that I could wrap the carpet around the livewell panel vs trying to work the livewell panel through a hole in the carpet. Whatever.... it's done.
Last piece! Glued up n' ready to go.... Blue tape w/white mark denotes the center of the piece. The carpet has it's mate stuck to it.
Speaking of it's mate.... Here 'tiz.... glued up n' flashin'....
And installed - DONE!
Some photos of the finished console area....