Automotive Interior Repair with The Interior Guy

What a dreary day….It’s rained here now for 2 days solid. We’re getting whats left of hurricane Hanna. We needed it though, things were starting to dry up. It’s hard to believe we needed the rain after all we had this spring. I makes it hard doing interior repair when it’s so wet outside though, water based dyes take forever to dry and whats really hard is trying to fix a cigarette burn in cloth when the humidity is so high, virtually impossible. But I did manage to get some stuff done today, and one that I’m going to talk about today and it’s those ugly screw holes in plastic that have been left from the previous owner of the automobile.

I got into a 2007 Chevy Avalanche today at one of my dealers to clean and repair the drivers seat. When I got done with the seat and was wiping up some dirt on the carpet, I happened to look up and directly under the steering column on the dash panel were 2 screw holes in the dash from a trailer brake that had been removed, I about choked. This truck didn’t have but maybe 30k miles on it and screws had already been put in the dash, I couldn’t believe it. There has got to be a better place to mount those things, but whats done was done and now I had to fix it.

This repair is not that hard to do, and can really make a difference in the appearance of an automobile. Automotive plastic no matter where it is in the vehicle can be repaired the same way, this repair works for all screw holes and small holes as well. Now the holes say the size of pencil eraser are about the biggest you can go with this one. The holes you see where a toggle switch has been are really too big for this fix.

First and foremost is getting rid of the burr’s and raised area left from the removal of the screw. Most of the time the holes have not been pre-drilled so there’s a raised portion around the holes and burrs left from the threads of the screw as it is screwed into the plastic. To remove this and make the holes level you will need to trim this off. The way I do this is with a brand new razor blade. I use a new one because you will need a very sharp edge to cut the plastic, and not your fingers. Take your razor blade and lay it flat up against the plastic piece and push it through the plastic that is raised up, making the screw hole level with the rest of the area.

Here’s the fix. It’s a kneadable epoxy, it’s like play-do. The stuff I use is Magnum Plastic/Marine & Fiberglass Repair Epoxy Putty. But I have also seen a product on TV that is basically the same stuff, called Mighty Putty, you’ve probably seen it. It’s great, just slice a small amount off knead it into a ball to get the two parts combined, tear a small amount off then push it into the screw hole. Now leave a little bit above the hole, don’t push it all the way through, basically a little glob on top. Grab your 240 grit sandpaper and sand lightly over the glob until it’s level, finishing with a finer grit like 400 or 600. You have to kinda work fast this stuff sets up pretty quickly, 15 minutes to be exact. Inspect the hole and see if it’s all filled in, if not pinch a little more off and push into the hole, sand and inspect. If it’s level and all filled in, your done filling and now it’s time to clean the area thoroughly with your prepping solution.

Sometimes depending on the size of the screw hole and where it’s at, you may need to texture the area a little. Now I use the heavy body water based spray grain for dashes and door panels. I do it the old fashioned way with a mouth atomizer, I have a little more control with it that way. If you have a smooth piece of plastic, then no need for the texturing. Sometimes you may need to apply a surface primer to help fill in the small imperfections on the smooth plastics.

Lastly, apply your grip base then dye the area to match with your water based dyes and then topcoat with the appropriate sheen of topcoat.

When your done the screw holes in the plastic should be gone and look at the difference it makes on the appearance of the automobile, wow.

This fix is a great way to eliminate those unsightly screw holes in automotive plastic dashes and plastic trim panels. As far as that 2007 Chevy Avalanche it turned out pretty good, you could still see the areas just a little, the grain in those dashes are pretty hard to imitate, but it still looked better then two big holes sitting there staring at you on pretty much a new vehicle.

ITW #44229 2OZ Repair Epoxy Putty 2 OZ, Magnum Plastic/Marine & Fiberglass Repair Epoxy Putty, 15 Minute Set Time, 1,500 PSI Bond Strength , Adheres Above Or Below Waterline, Fresh Or Saltwater Application, Dries White, Will Not Shrink And Is Rustproof, Uses Include Plastic, Fiberglass, Plastic, PVC Pipe. *Manufacturer: ITW CONSUMER *Model number: 44229 *UPC Code: 078727442298 *Length: 2.88 *Width: 1.25 *Height: 7.88

Mighty Putty As Seen On TV Mighty putty bonds to almost any surface Easy to use epoxy resin will fix fill and seal almost anything Can be painted sanded machined tapped or drilled when fully cured Easy to use instructions included 3 tubes

Well I hope your holiday weekend was a good one. Labor Day is always the last blast of the summer here for us. We spent our time at the lake soaking up some sun, and fun. It was a beautiful weekend, and the lake was finally back down to pretty much normal from all the rain we’ve had here. This year was definitely one for the record books. With the lake being up so far and so murky that the fishing has been terrible, but I did manage to pull a few out this year. I caught two this time down, a 14″ and a 15″ Bass, not real sure what the weight was on them though, but they were a couple of beauty’s.

As I was sitting there on the dock this weekend I couldn’t help to think of what I was going to write this week. I started thinking of some jobs that have been somewhat of booger for me, and I couldn’t help to think of the fist time I painted silver plastic trim. You know where the paint rubs off or scratches off and leaves you the black plastic underneath. Read the rest of this entry »

What a beautiful work day it was here in the Ozarks! We had 60’s in the morning and low 80’s this afternoon, which is really unusual for August.

Well I said in my last post that I would give you guys a post on my daily activities, and heres the first. Thought I’d share a little of what I do on a daily basis, to let you all know in a little more detail of the repairs I do on a daily basis. The way I’m gonna try to do this is to not just list the vehicles I worked on and tell you what I fixed and so on, but I’m gonna pick a couple that either gave me fits or I feel would be a good one to talk about. Some will be long and some short, but I hope to give you a lot of info. Read the rest of this entry »

Weather change is here and the cracked padded dashes are rolling in. With every weather change I get the phone calls. “My dash is cracked and what can be done to fix it.”

Due to the exposer to old mother nature, these materials become dried out and crack over time leaving you with a crack in your dash. Left unattended this small crack can and will get larger.

There are measures that can be taken to prevent the dash from getting cracked in the first place. Now I know your dash is already cracked and your wanting to know how to fix it, but this will prevent further cracks and keep your car cooler and looking nicer, and well…. for further reference. Read the rest of this entry »

Automotive interior repair is a skill of a combination of art and magic, yes I said magic…What I really mean is it’s a skill to be able to trick the eye from not seeing an interior repair that has been made, that is the magic.

One little trick that we keep in our bag of pixie dust, is the art of texturizing a repair.

If you look in your automotive interior you see many different textures on the surfaces of the plastic trim pieces, vinyl covered door panels, and your leather and vinyl seats. All of these textures you see we have to imitate in someway to repair whatever has been damaged.

Texturizing a repair takes knowledge of products to use, skill in using them, and a lot of patience. Yes patience, when doing any automotive interior repair, patience is a virtue, if you get in a hurry you will fail, I promise. Read the rest of this entry »

The Dash Peel. A problem I started noticing in some of the earlier model vehicles a few years back and have been fixing them ever since. The cause is the water based dyes being used on dashes and some trim pieces being lifted from the plastic by solvent based dressings and cleaners being sprayed on the inside of our cars in the attempt to keep them looking new and clean.

Solvents and water based dyes just don’t mix, obviously. Read the rest of this entry »

Color Matching is a huge skill and a must in the leather repair industry. I’ve been coming across a few vehicles lately that have been dyed with not so good color matching. Knowing that it’s usually someone either color blind or just down right…well I won’t go that far, but if the color isn’t right then your repair will look worse then if you had just left it alone.

Good lighting does help and pretty much a necessity. Natural lighting is better but in the garages we get stuck in the winter months it doesn’t help much, but what do you do, you improvise as my wife says. I use a dent light, which works pretty good, but I have also have used a under the hood light bar then hooking inside the car that stretches the width of the car and hooks on the door jams, they work great. Shorter light bars are great for light in a small places. Be careful with using florescence they sometimes throw your tinting off, if you can get some natural light to your project then great. The customer sees the the car in natural light mostly anyways so your color needs to be spot on.

Read the rest of this entry »

This is a must see. Leather Magic is something else, if this product does what it says then wow. Not only is durable it stretches and holds in place.

There are a few downfalls, one the curing time. 48 hours, maybe for an individual but not for a tech in the field. The compounds I know of are quick and easy…And work. But if there is the repair that will hold up like that and then I’m all for to checking it out, looks. The other concern I have is dye, dying onto a wet surface…HMMMM. Don’t know. Well I’ll make a check into this and see.

Leather repair is a craft and not all products will work on everything. Trial and error to extent, but cleaning and prepping your area extensively, before you start any project will make your ending result a success.

Hope you like this it is pretty wild stuff.

If you got any comments on this one let me know, I’m really curious to see what everyone thinks on Leather Magic.

This is a hard one for me to put out there for the average person to read because a lot of the products I use in my leather repairs are sold for professional use and if you don’t know how to use them properly you can make a bad thing look like a really bad repaired thing. It’s taking me a long time to master the craft of leather repair, it’s something you can’t just learn by reading this article. But I wanted to help out those of you who need a helping hand with that worn leather seat. Read the rest of this entry »

So your driving down the road with what looks like an open parachute attached to the interior roof of your car.
Well that open parachute would be your headliner material. Read the rest of this entry »