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History / OriginalityGot a question about 1982-1992 Camaro or Firebird history? Have a question about original parts, options, RPO codes, when something was available, or how to document your car? Those questions, answers, and much more!
Did you happen to take the cloth off of the headrest too? A previous owner removed the seat belt guides and mounting piece inside the headrest has shifted and the only way to get to them is to take apart the headrest.
I have taken the cloth off of the '82 as recently as this weekend. I didn't remove the headrest itself. Lift the head rest to it's highest position and using a pair of pliers, carefully grip the zipper. The zipper tag that you normally use to open and close a zipper wasn't on mine, so I just grabbed the part the tag would connect to. It made it simple to unzip. From there, start at an inside corner, compress the foam enough to get the cover over the corner. Do this on the other inside corner until you have one side out. From there, you should be able to work the cover off of one side. Once loose, the other side lifts right up off of the foam. You should be able to put the seat belt guide back together at that point. I had to use a much larger screw through the metal plate because the hole was stripped. It works great now.
One of my winter projects was replacing my old beat up stripes with new ones on my yellow, '85. I removed the stripes yesterday. Better late than never! Looks kind of cool without them. I left that one stripe in front of the wheel because it was perfect and might help guide me with the new stripes.
Woah,that at does look as good "naked" as it does with the stripes. If the black door molding was gone or yellow it would look a bit cleaner but outstanding either way!!
Woah,that at does look as good "naked" as it does with the stripes. If the black door molding was gone or yellow it would look a bit cleaner but outstanding either way!!
You know Tony, I kind of like it without the stripe! I already have the Phoenix stripe kit though, and will probably put them on this weekend.
This is also one of those cars with a screaming fuel pump after 35 minutes of driving on a warm day. I replaced the clogged canister filter with no changes. I just bought a vented GM fuel cap. We'll see what happens with that......
I should also probably remove, disassemble and clean my fuel tank valve.
Woah,that at does look as good "naked" as it does with the stripes. If the black door molding was gone or yellow it would look a bit cleaner but outstanding either way!!
I have to agree with TTOP350. My 1985 is red and had the black door moldings on it. I had an extra set of door moldings for the car so I removed the black ones and sprayed the other set with red vinyl paint to match the car. By doing this I was able to remove all the old residue that had built up above and below the original door guards.
The 1986 models came from the factory with color matching door guards. If your lucky enough to find a yellow set that would make things easier. This was a 100% improvement on my red 1985. It was easy to remove the black guards once I heated them up like you did to remove the stripes on your car. The hard part was getting them back on straight.
To do this I temporarily taped a 3 foot yard stick with masking tape on the door just below the spot the door guards were going to go back on so they would be level. I put double sided 3m tape on the back of the trim before I painted them red so the edge of the double sided tape also got painted red and blended much better than the greyish color of the 1/32" edge of the double sided tape that mainly shows on the top side of the door guard trim. Leave the paper on the sticky backing of the tape till you are ready to put them on.
The door guard trim strips have a metal strip in them and can get bent up or down. I just carefully straightened them before painting them. All of this was a pain to do but well worth it if you want to keep the guards on the door. It is surprising how much better looking this one little detail can be to blend the the side body lines on a third gen. You can always go back to the original black ones if you want to keep it totally original. I think these cars look the best with no door guard, but if you totally remove them at this time there may be some paint fading that shows above and below where the strip had been.
Last edited by yo soy el warg; May 8, 2017 at 03:10 AM.
Your car looks outstanding with the new stripes. I have always liked the gold wheels and tan interior color combination with the yellow exterior. For the third gen body style this is the super stand out combo !!!!!!!!!
Your car looks outstanding with the new stripes. I have always liked the gold wheels and tan interior color combination with the yellow exterior. For the third gen body style this is the super stand out combo !!!!!!!!!
How a 2 minute wipe down turns into a 90 minute project.
I was wiping down the dash of my '85 in preparation for Expo when I notice some spots on my speedo lens. Wipe them, still there. Use a stronger cleaner, still there. This stuff bugs me. Call me weird if you want, I don't care. So I removed the bezel and lens and started polishing......
More polishing......
Finally after an hour, whatever those "spots" were, were gone.
BTW, if your IP lens is cloudy and scratched, remove it and polish it. It'll look like new and make you feel a whole lot better about driving your 3rd gen!
BTW, if your IP lens is cloudy and scratched, remove it and polish it. It'll look like new and make you feel a whole lot better about driving your 3rd gen!
I used the same product on my cluster lens last year, with the same great results. I highly recommend this easy and inexpensive improvement.
Interesting. I was talking to an original owner of an 85 at the annual Camaro show out here and he was saying that GM had some trouble with yellow in 85 and thats what prompted them to introduce white for the IROC-Z in mid year.
Brought the yellow '85 back home and took the '87 to my parents. I parked it in the garage last night and noticed what looked like a bunch of dirt on the hood around both louvers - except the dirt was moving. It was a big black mama spider with hundred of baby spiders coming out of the louvers.
I think I got 'em all.
Got it out of mom's garage just in time!
One obvious observation. After dropping off my LG4 '87, and bringing home my '85 - an L69 cammed LB9 with a 3.42 gear is A LOT faster than an LG4 with a 2.73.
Anyway, a bunch of little things I need to do to it. I must have an AC leak, because it needs a recharge. Maybe I'll have time tomorrow.
AC doesn't need a recharge. Low pressure switch is bad - again! I just replaced that thing a couple of years ago. It can't have more than 20 hours on it. Damned cheap Chinese parts!
I just signed up on Flickr also.
