Interior and Bed Ideas

Naturally everyone's opinions will vary, but I got to start somewhere. I have noone around with any hotrods or custom interiors. Most webpages I find only have exteriors so that doesn't help one bit.

The inside of my 41 Chevy Pickup is completely barren. So I'm going to have to fabricate door panels, interior, put seats in, weatherstripping, and all that jazz.

1. Are there any good pages out there listing what materials to use for door panels and interior? My uncle has an upholstery shop to actually lay the new cloth, but I want to have the rest ready.

2. I plan on having a removable top, anyone know a good way to decorate the inside of the removable top so it won't be to fragile and what type of hinges to use?

3. What are some good donor cars for seats or places to get them. The Nissan Sentra seats in there are so wide they touch in the middle and go door to door.

Thanks for any help guys. It's tough using just occasional magazine pics and articles to figure all this out. To bad I don't have a mentor around to help out.

I have upholstered a lot of my own homebuilt hotrods, and though I am far from expert, this worked very well for me. First off, you are going to have to make patterns, so find a source for large sheets of cardboard---I get mine from a local machine shop that uses them to make patterns for there flame cutting table (old technology). Make patterns, trial fit them, then transfer them to 1/8" luan mahogany (in English thats interior door skins, from your local lumber store). Find a source for "landua top foam" which is actually a 1/8" foam rubber used by auto upholstery shops. Spray the mahogany panel with spray on contact cement, (outside), spray the 1/8" foam on one side (it's not cut to size yet), wait 10 minutes place mahogany on foam, trim around edge with a razor blade, using edge of plywood as a guide. Find out what material you are using, cut it out about 1 1/2" larger than your pattern all around, spray the inside of the fabric (the surface which goes against the foam), spray the foam that is already stuck to the mahogany, lay material flat, with glue side up, arrange for wife, kids, and family dog to hold the corners to pull out any wrinkles, and place glued panel against glued fabric. Flip the whole thing over, spray exposed 1 1/2" of fabric and about 3" onto perimeter of mahogany, and carefully fold fabric over and stick it down---corners are a real bear. Go to upholstery shop & get some fancy screws to hols it on with. (upholstery shop has snap on screw head covers that can be upholstered to match whatever material you use. Get a peice of 3/8" foam rubber rope from auto upholstery shop, cut favric 3" wide and fold & glue it around rubber rope to make "piping" , stick piping on where exposed edges of panel will show, like door jams before screwing on panel. This works great for door panels and kick panels and behind the seat. For compuond curves You can buy a formable cardboard, but I have never used it. Hope this helps.

E-Z boy rod interior kits
www.rodinteriors.com
Think I'm gonna use these guys stuff when I get to that point...