Firewall and Cowl Insulation, '71 Convertible

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Joined
Dec 24, 2013
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Location
Minnesota
My Car
71 convertible
I am looking for some help finding or reproducing the under dash/cowl insulation for a '71 convertible. You can see the backside of the padding in these photos.

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You can get reproductions of the firewall padding behind the heater and AC boxes, but not this upper piece, at least as far as I can tell. If anyone has one out of a car that can trace a pattern or take some photos, that would be most helpful. Also, if anyone knows where I can get some of this material - it's kinda like jute with a crinkly black plastic ply on the interior side.

Thanks!

 
image.jpgMike, I could not find this padding for my 72 vert, non ac. I had enough remnants to make a pattern. I settled for some silver back jute from a local GM reproduction store. I then sprayed adhesive to stick it to the body.

I will check to see if I still have the old pieces to make a pattern tomorrow if you want. PM me. Eric.

 
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Mike,

I am a huge believer in "originality" and putting rare or special cars back together as concourse. That being said, for items that cannot be seen by anyone including judges, I see no reason to put some old jute back in that has no real heat or noise displacing properties. Your call obviously, just my two cents...

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I have heard of others using the jute material available on the internet or through other outlets and covering it with a thick heavy mill black plastic (garbage bags even) to replicate as close to possible as the original. No one produces it at this point. I ended up going with Lizardskin sound and heat on the entire interior compartment and painted the cowl underside black and the rest exterior body color.

 
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The original stuff was nothing like what is under the carpet. It is very fluffy and light and the plastic backing is very thin not even grocery bag thickness. I will look at the 72 mach 1 that has been sitting in the back yard since I think 76. I took the majority of the dash out but no more. The remnants of the insulation should be there. All should be the same.

When I was getting the 73 vert I have with only 48,000 miles cleaned up I did not try to put back original I got some sticky back foam with foil but does not have all the advertisement pasted on it.

Remember these were only built to last maybe 5 years back then. [/align]

 
Agree with David. I can't describe how badly my original factory applied insulation had deteriorated in this area when I tore the car down last Fall. There is no doubt that the Tuscon, AZ heat had something to do with the complete disintegration of my factory installed "fluffy" plastic lined insulation.

As I disassembled the interior, I was wondering why there was so much dirt in the upper area of the hidden dash components. Besides the standard air borne dirt one would expect to have in an AZ driven vert, there was a crystallized additional coating of dust on much of the under dash area. I noticed that the upper insulation had completely fallen down, laying on all of the components. As time went by, the "fluffy" insulation broke down to the point of no longer looking like the factory installed application. There was also the light black plastic cover piece laying on top of everything, but much of the insulation had broken down and was just missing...

I had previously confirmed that this thin upper insulation was not available and decided that after what happened to the factory insulation over time, I was not going to let that happen with my restoration. As this area will not be seen, I went with a foil covered heat resistance newer technology insulation that was easy to glue to the upper dash area and more importantly, will not break down like the factory original...

 
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