1985 900 Notchback

[DrewP]

There are at least two sets up there now...

http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/Saab-900 ... ccessories

Those lamps have the lens pattern for driving on the left side of the road though, like from the UK, weird that Canada got those ones?

[Jordan]

There are at least two sets up there now...

http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/Saab-900 ... ccessories

Those lamps have the lens pattern for driving on the left side of the road though, like from the UK, weird that Canada got those ones?

Good call. Well the other pair that was up there is the correct pattern.. I checked those

[hutch]

Got a little bit done before the storms came in this evening and got most of the remaining interior back in. Also took some pictures of an upcoming project, to restore this steering wheel. Its a great small diamater wheel thats nice and thick but its crumbling at my fingertips. Its worst when its really humid out like after an afternoon thunderstorm and it will rub off all over your hands when driving. It shouldn't be too hard to fix so I'd like to get it done sooner rather than later.




There are companies that make stitch-it-yourself leather wraps for wheels that I was considering until my friend suggested something like tennis racquet tape which intrigued me. I think the leather would almost certainly look and feel better but the racquet tape would probably work pretty well and its easily reversible, though that would most certainly take some material off with it. I also want to get a rubber o-ring or something to better fix that saab horn piece into place, as it stands now theres a slight gap so it falls out, again shouldn't be that hard to take care of so I will probably take it to home depot or the like and look for something that works.

[SwedeSport]

You can try the stuff that 10 speed bike handlebars are wrapped with.

[Jordan]

Tennis racquet grips are going to be too short , you'd need a lot of them and that might look funny. Most of them have strong adhesives on the back like you said.

The horn button usually has a metal wire that holds it in. I'm not sure if that is needed to make good ground contact to complete the circuit.

You could also try some black fabric dye on those seats. It may help them match. I think it's the purple or red in them that makes them look a bit off.

Lots of progress!

[hutch]

Yeah I have some of this stuff to dye the seats:
http://www.summitracing.com/parts/CBD-271/


I used some water based dye on the passengers seat and as you can tell it doesn't work to well it pretty much just soaked it up and darkened the blue up a bit. I used the Colorbond stuff on the carpets and it worked pretty well so I'm hoping it works for the seats as well. I also found a local store that carries SEM products so they can be my last shot I just figured I'd try to stick to the same product so the colors match OK. Once they are fully black I think they will look much better, as it stands now theres a little too much 9-2x going on for my taste

[Jordan]

The SEM stuff works pretty well as does the dupicolor. The nice thing about black... is it is black.. not much variation on that.

Are you going to hit the convention this year?

[hutch]

Yeah that is the nice thing about matching black, especially low gloss interior pieces. The main reason I used the colorbond stuff again is I had used the duplicolor on carpets and it was pretty crusty which was fine for the carpets but the colorbond seemed to go on smooth which I thought would wear better when they get sat in. That and I needed to order stuff from summit anyway and I hadn't yet found the local shop with the SEM products or I probably would have done that the whole time to save on shipping and downtime.

As for the convention, hopefully so, I haven't been to a Saab show in a while so I may try especially with how close it is to PA.

[Jordan]

I find if you use a stiff brush after you spray it up it keeps the fibers somewhat separated and cuts back on the stiffness and clumping. Also helps spread the dye a bit.

[SwedeSport]

My horn button is tight in the summer, but would fall out in winter. I put a dab of rtv on it and have not seen a problem. The key to the dyes is knowing what the composition of the fabric is. Most auto upholstery is plastic based, so dyes don't absorb well. Most colorants just coat the fibers. I used dupli color on mine and have to freshen it up everytime its apart. It wears thin in short order.

[Jordan]

That's true, the old 99 stuff I think is actually wool and takes dye much better.

[hutch]

Good point about the plastic upholstery, I hadn't thought of it that way, I also have some of the same company's vinyl/plastic spray that I used on the door cards so maybe I should try that at first. I do have a pretty thick brush that came with an earlier dye that I've been using to flatten some of the crunch out so hopefully that will help. Also good idea with the RTV, the space is big enough that it definitely needs something thick but I'll remember to put some RTV on it just to keep it from sliding around.

[Scott]

That really makes me miss my 86.



The car looks pretty cool, I like the shelbys and the older style headlights. Is it the pictures, or is the dash fuzzy?

[hutch]

First off, sweet '86, that looks like it was in good shape. And yes the dash is fuzzy

I had a dash laying around that was completely destroyed with cracks so I decided to do something about it. A lot of rally cars use this "flock" stuff to reduce glare:
http://www.dirtyimpreza.com/forums/show ... hp?t=11252


So since I had a few feet of microsuede fabric left I figured I'd try my hand at something similar. It pretty much soaks up any and every piece of dust, etc... which is kind of a pain but I figure it looks better than a completely messed up dash. If I'm ever bored with my car I'd like to try the flock routine myself but this should last me a year or two.

[hutch]

Got the seats dyed black so it matches a little better, realized I'm awful at taking pictures which is ironic given that the PO, my cousin, is in school for photography. But here goes:



You can see why I chose these seats over a set of stock ones, although like I said earlier they wouldn't be legit for sanctioned racing the bolsters are pretty bulky so they hold you in pretty tight in the corners. The only problem is the sliders basically dont work anymore due to where the bolts have to be placed in order to fit in the rear loops but they are in almost the perfect place for me so it works out.

Also when moving the car yesterday from under a tree due to a storm coming that was supposed to bring high winds I noticed the tach stopped moving after a few seconds so I tried the old fist to the dash that usually works for things like that but it didn't fix it so I'll get around to looking into it later. Thinking about getting a Bentley Manual for 8-valves but seeing as how that engine is not long for this world its likely not worth it.