87 Grand Prix-Chief S**tting Bull

[olds307 and 403]

You are a sucker for punishment, a T Top with a vinyl top. Double the rust, double the fun. Most of us aren't Donovan unfortunately. I was very happy how my vinyl roof to hard top conversion went, the rest, not so much. But I made ugly work, red primer clearcoated over half assed bodywork, I call a hammered metal finish, it sort of works.

 

[1evilregal]

I'm much happier with it as a hardtop, I just have to fix the outside behind the package tray/rear window, and get some trim around the window glass itself. I lucked out with getting hardtop quarter glass at a local junkyard awhile back!

just don't look at the hood too closely, Ilike I said, I did a light sanding over a shoddy repaint, and have alot of pock marks... I just wanted something to make it look decent from a distance.

 

[1evilregal]

well, proof positive that the Chief suffered no effects from the pandemic... he's still alive and doing better than he has in a good long while, almost makes it a shame that I've been considering finding him a new home in the future. having a break from work (1 week shutdown, and I took another week after that, to work on cars, house, and help a good friend on his place) , I figured I'd maybe tackle a few things that I've always been meaning to get to, ala DRIVEN style...

it started innocently enough with picking up a temp/compass/self dimming mirror from JAMCAR223 (if you get a chance to buy anything from him, you won't be disappointed!), and figured I'd take some pics along the way... I basically started out by running a couple lengths of wire (2 colors, totally uneducated guess on the length) tied one end off, and chucked the other end in a drill, and slowly wound the 2 wires together (sorry, no pic... decided to take pics for a possible thread after I did this).

I decided to mount the sensor behind the headlights, and run back from there, pic is a little fuzzy, but you can see it in the opening just ahead of the canister.

I ran my wires through the firewall where the speedo cable goes through (some of you may have a better location, I chose this because of the grommet and ease of access)
I ran the wires over the brake booster and down to the inner fender and forward. I took full advantage of all the wire loom, and for once, buried the wire the correct way.

once I had it finished outside, I move inside and took out the a-pillar/sunvisor/center t-top trims, and loosened the side dash trim, and ran my wires up and through the abs loom

 

[1evilregal]

from there, it was just figuring out how much wire was needed to drop out of the trim, and getting everything spliced in...

I didn't get a photo, but I located an accessory plug in the fuse panel for the power, and grounded it at the ground point at the bottom corner of the dash mount. Installed all the trim back in, and tested the function. results were pretty good!

unfortunately, on the way home, the mirror tab fell off, so I wasn't able to get the compass to calibrate, but am happy with the success. I picked up some adhesive on the way, and hope to have the mirror back on in a couple days.

 

[1evilregal]

well, doing something good on the car always leads to the dreaded "while I'm in here" syndrome. while I completely loathe electrical work, I guess the success of the mirror drove me on to finally getting the speakers wired in correctly, as a PO hacked into the original wires, and never tucked the extra 3' on each rear speaker in, and when I upgraded the 4x10's, I didn't take the time then to do it, and the sound quality had been pretty y, to say the least. while I had the rear seat out, I decided to finally do something about the fire hazard that was the fuel pump wire that said PO hacked beyond anything comprehendible... this is what I was lookin at for the fuel pump wire...

the wire you're looking for is the clear speaker wire in the first pic, the one attached to the white wire in the second (was a wire nut when I got it) and wire nutted to the heavy red wire in the third... stuff like this is all over the car...

ran new monster cable for the rear speakers all the way from the speakers to the radio, but didn't really seem to get any pics, but once again, I fished the wires through the existing looms, and removed all the old wiring. must be getting old, cause I'm zipping up and tucking all the loose wiring so I won't have to deal with it all later...

hope to have more updates soon.

 

[Happy camper]

Looking good , what did the mirror come out of , i would like to do this in the future also.

 

[5spdCab]

Looking good , what did the mirror come out of , i would like to do this in the future also.

Two threads here at GBF you can check out for interior mirrors. 1) "rear view mirror upgrade options", in the interior category. 2) "junkyard interchange and rarities thread", in the how to's/knowledge base category.
Also, if you are interested, a thread on electric exterior mirrors, "power mirror upgrade", also in the how to's/knowledge base category.

 

[1evilregal]

Not sure what they came out of, but if you happen to come across one at the junkyards, remember to grab the sensor behind the grille

 

[Texas82GP]

Nice progress Darin. I admire that you're driving your G body.

 

[1evilregal]

I’ve actually been putting quite a few miles on it already this year. I’ve been enjoying it, but with all the little things that pop up, it takes away from the original plan of motivating me to work on the other cars...