I'm cutting up my arm rests for my roll bar in my camaro, now I need to find a way to make them look presentable. Would recovering in some cloth be possible, or am I forced to fiberglass it somehow?

 

If you decide to fiberglass it give me a call. I want to learn how to do that. I've got some idea of how, so maybe I can even help. I'll bring the beer.

 

I put a 6pt roll cage in mine and removed the arm rest. I took some black spary paint and painted the arm rest brackets and bolted a nylon strap to the bolt holes. This allowed me to shut the door when I was buckled in.

 

pics? and does it look like crap in your opinion? this car goes to numerous car shows a year, so I don't want it to look halfassed

 

I don't have any pic right now. The car is in the trailer and don't want to get it out in this weather, if you know what I mean. In my opinion it doesn't look like crap; but I wouldn't call it car show quality. If you show this car, I would try to paint the brakets the same color as the interoir and let it go. I don't know what type of seat belts you have, but I have troulbe shutting my door stapped in my 5pt harness. I need to have the window down or try to grap the window lip to shut my door. If the weahter breaks I will try to get some pics. Hope this helps.

 

I have a 5 point harness and have no trouble reaching the factory arm rest while strapped in. I guess I'll have to look into making up new door panels to delete the arm rests and not have an ugly hole sitting there, or make some sort of patch panel to go into that location instead. Don't worry about it, my camaro is in storage until spring as well so I understand not pulling it out.

 

Are you dead set on using the armrests? I am going through the same thing as we speak. I have a 12pt cage and the arm rest didn't fit on mine either. I drilled out the rivets on the bracket that goes behind the door panel (arm rest mount) and threw it in the round file. Then I took the door panels to the interior shop and a had them add 1/4" of foam shaped like the door panel before they applied the fabric (grey tweed). This completely covered the holes to the point it looks like there were never any armwrests. Trust me I need my interior to be choice and no halfassed jobs especially with a magazine car!

 

1dwncam, do you have pics of the interior panels? I'd cover over the arm rests as well as another option if I found a setup that looked nice.

 

Currently the car is at the interior shop, and not put together yet. I'll post pics just as soon as I get her back.

 

anyone else?

 

checking for other pics or ideas

 

Buy the roll bars that are notched downward / bent to clear our doors. Spohn sells them if i remember correctly

 

yea my cage is in the car already, and the way I have the main hoop setup I didn't want to use the bent bars, because the angles would be wrong. but thanks for the offer...since the cage is already in the car for 2 years now.

 

anyone else have some pics or ideas?

 

xpndbl3- I was planning on showing the pictures of my new interior panels with the door bar. But then I picked the car up yesterday and found out the shop who painted the cage did a horrible job and the paint started to peel off while the interior was being done. Suffice to say I'm not happy, so now all the interior has to be taken out and back to the paint shop it goes. I did add a few pictures on my cardomain page to give you an idea of the new seats and the peeling door bars.

http://www.cardomain.com/ride/2368130/7


Seems like nothing goes smoothly when building a car.

 

i painted my cage with $12 worth of rustoleum products and it's held up for 3 years no problem. I used the etching zinc primer after sanding it all down and using grease/wax remover. Then sprayed on a charcoal with silver flake that they offered and a clear coat. Plus touch up to areas due to belts or sliding up and down the bars is cheap as well. Sorry to hear about your issues, but this car has been fighting me for 7 years now, so I'm used to projected taking longer than expected.

 

I had the same problem when I installed my cage.
I just removed the armrests. Installed a piece of brushed aluminum sheet metal, neatly trimmed over the holes. Then I made a set of door pulls out of an expired 5 point harness that matches my existing 5 point harness.
Kind of ties the interior together a bit more.
Thats the best I could come up with.
I'm interested too if someone has any better ideas.

 

fastcars got any pics?

 

Sorry, I don't have any interior pics at the moment.
My cars put away for the winter as well, won't be able to get to it for a couple more months either.

 

just giving this a montly bump to see if anyone happened to get some shots of their door panels and arm rest mods

 

Well i just picked up an 82 t/a with a 6 point cage. door panels were just hangin there not really mounted. so im gonna come up with something to either cover up the holes or cut the arm rest arround the bar, and then just rewrap it with something. This will be happening within the next week or so, ill get pics up as soon as i can.

on another note, yall are all saying you put your cars up till spring, thats just seems crazy. But again, im from Austin Tx.

 

well if you give me pics of your interior and where the problem is i might be able to photoshop some ideas for you. I'd go with a fiberglass arm that either has just a dip in it for a handle or has a small gap to be used as a hadle to close the door. you could even use the exsisting holes for the armrest and make a custom metal peice if you can weld. just make it tight enough to clear the bar and then bump it out off the door so you have a handle and form it to run back nice and tight.
----------
or you could just get the back hole covered and fab a small piece for the front two holes. tell me if you want something that runs straight across and bends 90 up or if you want a 45 bend up or if you want a straight piece to run direct from one hole to the other or you could have a swooping piece that has a gradual upward bend to it.

Give me an idea on what you want and ill photoshop something rough and if you like the idea ill fine-tune it so you have a nice picture to go off of when you try to make it or get it made

 

Anyone pull their cars out of storage yet and have any ideas?

 

hmm this didn't bump it to the top for some reason...?

 

well i have finialy finnished the headlight problems, and center console problems, so im gonna start working on getting the door panels done, and and i will see what i can come up with.

 

I drilled out the rivets like one other person said and then I found on Ebay this company that does custom door panels and I had them make the door panels with out the arm rest holes. I have attached a pic, take a look and let me know what you think.

 

doesn't look too bad with no armrest actually. I think I might do that and look into a way to incorporate some sort of "loop" out of maybe an old racing harness or something similar to help with closing the door.

 

I have been searching for a cage now for ever it seems, and i have came up with nothing, that looks good and will clear a stock arm rest. And it seems like a good idea to just do the armrest delete, and be done with it. If you dont mind me asking, what is the companys name that made those door panels for you. thanks

 

Mine is done with a old tie down not pretty but works

 

still haven't figured out the arm rest issue yet, but I figure recovering the door panels should be easy enough with some cloth from a jo ann fabric store or whatever. Probably just do the 5 point harness thing and use a section of them to use to close the door.

 

I allmost broke my wrist slaming my door and got it cought between the 100lbs door and the cage

 

Hey BT283 the name of the place that did the door panels is:
L&M's Cruisin Customs Inc.
They did an excellent job and I found them on eBay. I dont see any now on eBay but type in "firebird custom door panel" and sometime I'm sure you will see one. I just saw one a week or so ago.
I got my cage from Jegs and I was very pleased with it.
----------
Oh yeah, it may look like you could get away with the armrest but to no avail the door will not close. Well it could I guess if you have the down bar lower but it may not look right? Well that is just my 2 cents.

 

I have added another pic of what the door panel looks like with the door closed. I just close the door from the top of the door. I can see what you mean if you do not close the door properly you could get it caught.

Hopefully soon I will put some stuff on ebay so that I can get some cash in to feed the beast. I am looking to purchase a headliner, louder exhaust and racing seats for this summer. I just purchased new wheels and tires so that should make it look better.

 

looks good SK, i'll be buying some fabric in the coming weeks to do something similar. Going to want to run some sort of handle to close the door, who knows what I'll come up with.

 

Sorry for bringing up an old post but ran a search and was curious to know what you were able to come up with.

Anyone else try anything different?

thanks

 

I would try to knotch the arm rest out with a dremel. Maybe put a slit in the vinyl, pull it back, dremel out the plastic armrest, then try to stretch the vinyl inside so it doesn't have a rough edge. That would work unless you pretty much have to cut the armrest in half for the bar to pass through. You could probably make a cover plate out of some cardboard fibre glass resin and cover it with some box carpet. Then cover the top hole with an emblem or something.

 

I ended up doing something very similar last night. I cut the vinyl with a razor knife the cut the plastic with a dremel. I filled in the hole with role cage padding and weatherstrip adhesive, now I just have to put something on top so it looks clean. It definitely looks a little weird when the door is open but it looks great when closed.

Thanks for the response.

 

Any pics of people's modified door handles or door panels to cover up the holes with handle removed?
I am putting in a cage and have to decide this week what I'm doing with the door bars...

 

TTT