Since the interior panels were already out, painted the wrong color and in pretty lousy condition cosmetically, we decided to refurbish and paint them.
Earlier in our restoration we took most of the interior panels out of the Shelby GT 350. We did this to make room to properly fix the floors and to make sure we didn’t get welding spatter on our hard-to-replace, all-original interior panels. Since they were already out, painted the wrong color and in pretty lousy condition cosmetically, we decided to refurbish and paint them.
Like most Shelbys, our original interior color was black. Our car had been painted somewhere during its life with semi-gloss black paint. Peter Geisler from Orlando Mustang pointed out that, originally, the Shelby was painted with a black metallic paint. NPD carries this paint in aerosol cans and after studying our panels, we realized Peter was 100 percent correct: They were originally a nearly black metallic. The paint went on perfectly in several light coats and looked great, reviving the interior panels to excellence.
The next step was to paint the entire inside floor area of the car with POR-15 rust preventive paint. We have had good luck with this product and also dabbed it liberally on the inside of the quarter panels, and any other crevices we could find.
At this time, we also installed an insulation kit from Quiet Ride Solutions. We use some type of modern insulation on every project car we do. We feel modern insulation is one of the best revolutions in car restoration in the last 30 years.
Certain companies, like Quiet Ride Solutions, have taken this NASA space program insulation idea to the next level. They designed an entire kit with the proper size and style pieces precut for every area inside the car.
We have struggled with sheet insulation before, cutting and trimming each piece ourselves. We got good results, but having every piece cut to size sure makes the job easier and quicker. Quiet Ride Solutions hit the patterns perfectly and we were very impressed with both the fit and the end results of this insulation kit. The car got much quieter, cooler and more comfortable to ride in.
We found a high-grade original loop-style carpet kit from NPD. It too, fit perfectly.
At this point it was time to restore the folding rear seat. This carpeted area is trimmed in chrome and ours was in sad shape. NPD came to the rescue again: They sell a chrome kit for a couple of hundred dollars that is cheaper than having your pieces professionally rechromed. We cleaned and treated our original back seat, as it was in good condition.
Reinstalling the restored back seat was not as easy as we thought it would be, but we did wrestle it into place. We got it all adjusted and, voilà, our interior was looking pretty darned good again. We would deal with the dashboard and door panels at a later date.
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Update by Tim Suddard to the
