Ray's Chevy (and GMC) Restoration Site
Page 6 of 6 ... November 2022 - present
After putting it off for nearly 10 years, we dicided to finally replace the headliner and dash pad.
The headliner currently in the '77 is a replacement that we put in many years ago. Although still in good condition, it is too dark and is not the correct material (it's covered with 80's style cloth vs. the original perforated vinyl). Our local upholstery shop (Bartman's Upholstery) tried to re-cover a headliner board for us a few years ago. However, they were unable to find an original type foam backed perforated vinyl material that would follow the contours of the liner board without wrinkling. And none of the materials they did find were available in the original colors so it would have to be dyed too.
So after a bit of research, we decided to order a new headliner from USA1 Industries. They are one of the only companies (that I could find) selling these headliners covered in the original type perforated vinyl material that's also also offered in factory original colors. However, from what I've read, they are a relatively small company that manufactures many of their parts on an as-needed basis so there can be significant wait times (12 to 16 weeks according to the email I received after placing the order).
We had been thinking of dying the original faded dash pad with SEM Color Coat. But upon closer inspection, we noticed several small cracks that had formed in the speaker grille area. And one was starting to spread farther back. That would be a very difficult spot to repair without plugging the tiny holes that form the speaker grille. So while we decided to order a new dash pad along with the headliner.
Years ago, I installed a Delco ETR (electronically tuned receiver) with 4 speaker outputs. This truck originally had a mono AM radio with a single dash speaker. The plan had been to replace that speaker with a pair of speakers on a homemade adapter plate and install 2 more speakers in the cab corners. I never did get around to replacing the single dash speaker. So now that we have the dash pad out for replacement, I'll tackle that project.
In the past, I made a similar adapter plate for my '77 Nova from a piece of ½" thick plywood. The Nova dash speaker mounts from the under-side of the dash (grille is built into the metal dash structure) so the thickness of the plate wasn't much of a concern. However, the pickup dash speaker mounts to the top side of the metal dash and is covered by the grille that's built into the dash pad. So I chose to make this adapter plate from a piece of 12 gauge steel plate (just a little under ⅛" thick, salvaged from an old heating oil tank). Probably overkill, but I didn't want to use anything too thin and have it vibrate with the speakers.
To connect these speakers to the stereo, I used a factory front speaker harness salvaged from an 80's GM pickup truck. That harness used Packard/Delphi 56-series connectors to plug into the factory speakers. Rather than cut them off and solder the wires directly to the new speakers, I chose to make up a little adpater harness and mount it to a bracket that I welded to the speaker adapter plate. I used a 5-cavity connector (leaving one unused) since I didn't have a 4-cavity one on hand. I'll simply extract the terminals from the speaker plugs and re-insert them into the mating 5-cavity plug (shown laying beside the speakers in the above photos) so the harness can plug directly into this speaker assembly.
The new headliner arrived much sooner than expected and looks great!
While the headliner trim pieces were out, I gave them a good cleaning and freshened them up with some SEM Color Coat (same as I had used earlier on the door panels).
The new headliner fit pretty good. The pre-punched holes in the plastic backer board for the dome light and sun visors were spot-on in terms of their size and location. The only issue was the radius of the curve at the right rear corner. I had to carefully warm up the backer board with a heat gun and re-shape it slightly to allow the factory corner trim piece to fit into place. With this one being the correct color and original type material, it looks much better than the dark blue cloth one that had been in there. The sun visors are still original and haven't been dyed (although, I did spray some SEM Color Coat on their mounting brackets which had faded a little over the years).
The new dash pad arrived right on time (according to the estimate I received when placing the order). Like the headliner, the dash pad looks great too! As can be seen in this photo, I had already transferred the simulated woodgrain trim plate over to the new pad.
In addition to that trim panel, we also had to transfer the mounting clips over from the old pad. And aside from having to trim off a little extra material around the instrument cluster opening, the new pad easily fit right into place.
Find (or have printed) some reproduction emissions decals for the engine (shown on the previous page).
Have the front bumper and bumper guards re-chromed (or maybe buy a new reproduction bumper).