Now I have the console finished up like it should be. I put in the new cross brace and ground the remaining plastic one out with my disc sander. I didn't have any small aluminum rod, but I found some quarter inch tubing, so I used that. I tapped each end for a 10 by 32 screw and then drilled the console and installed it.

I am not particularly happy with the blocking I put in the upper insert to mount the AC panels to, so I may add a little more ABS to those and fix it a little better. Nevertheless, I have both of those panels mounted for now.

I'll now get to work on the final mounting of the Double DIN NAV unit and tray. I have to check if and where I might want some air cooling holes in the tray and drill them with my uni-bit and then I need to drill the mounting holes for the four or so screws on each side where it will mount inside the console.

One thing you can see in the first and second pictures is how tight it is for the top two connector pins to the HVAC contol panel. I am still working on how to make those connections. Any Ideas??? Another thought I kind of have is the idea of just soldering wires to the male pins on the control and then putting male bullet connectors on the ends of the wires to plug into the female five-pin connector at the end of the wire harness in the car. I could then cover the pins and solder connection with shrink and call it good. That may very well be where I end up with this when I install it in the car.

You can also see where I have screwed the shifter boot and base into the lower insert. That's where it will stay. I will have to remove the lower insert to take the boot out for any reason.

 

I don't have the tray drilled or mounted yet, but here is the console kind of mocked-up with everything that it will likely entail.

 

Wow...love it.....having a 5-speed, and being a non smoker...I like the elimination of the cig. Lighter....USB ports would be great where the rear air control is, (no rear air on mine), or perhaps (1) set of USB ports on one side, and a modern / German looking hazard switch on the other...I dunno.....I love it!

 

The next one that I am going to do will be for the five speed. It too will have the controls for the rear air. I will be doing it in a slightly darker gray, but the shifter boot will be lite gray similar to this. It will be the gray combination that I am putting into the GTS4, which I hope the be workiing on some more shortly.

The I think I will do another one of these in the five speed version for the '85 I bought a while back. It will be in two-tone blue to go with the Iris Blue of the car. It will fit into the dark blue console. I actually have a pretty nice dark blue spare console that I will probably convert and hold it until I can get to the car's whole interior.

Can you show me what the usb ports look like? Also what do you have in mind exactly regarding the hazard switch? Either or both of those coud likely be put on this lower insert--there is plenty of room on it and probably under it.

 

can the connector be installed BEFORE screwing in the head unit?

 

The Connector is just too thick. Here is a picture of it.

 

now that i think about it.... when i did BigAl's kit, i had to cut in to the console, (plastic/foam) so the the plug had room.. THEN i had to cut/splice the harness about 4" back......

 

Since the upper insert must be installed from the front with the top of it kind of put into place first, since the air vent sticks up above the insert a little, there can not be anything sticking out the side of the insert for it to pass/rotate inward to its position. Then the connections will be made, and that will likely need to be with seperate wires from each male pin on the control. That will also give the extra length of wire that might be needed, as I think you are suggesting.

 

Maybe I have strange ideas - but the stock hazard switch started life on the console - I think that's where it really belongs - not much need to have it readily to hand every day on the pod.

I think the old stock hazard switch config. is just fine on the console. Old style console in Kermit (thanks to ChuckZ) clean looking no?



- Note also wiper switch on console and also the old style vents & ****.. the new area of vents they added by deleting this **** on later models simply blows air on the pod (useless) - I prefer this style and the 'real' **** to control it - mine will look like this one day - already have the vent panel, however the '83 auto flap control for the vent was actually a better idea functionally - so I'd make it an electric control **** (I already have the '83 console & vacuum pods too).

I think the rear wiper switch should be on the pod instead of hazard - thats where it started its life too - its a stupid location where it is now next to the "opening" ends of the window/sunroof switches. On days you operate the rear wiper you won't want to be opening the sunroof (& v-v). Besides - nasty mistakes can be made in carwashes that way... Some really backwards steps were taken during the evolution here IMO.



http://www.ebay.com/itm/928-Used-Rea...e8bfd3&vxp=mtr

Alan

 

Is. And hazard...similar to these.....

 

Hazard

 

Usb

 

The hazard switch looks pretty good, but I think there are better looking USB ports available on eBay. I found a couple that are about the same size as the hazard switch, so the would balance better with each other.

If the hazard switch was put on the console, what woud you do about the blank left on the pod? Maybe we could put the 12V power outlet there with the cigarette lighter in it. That could also double as an additional USB port.

 

Yea, that is the uglier one...I was pressed for time, and was just throwing out an example.

I was looking for the ones like the cigarette lighter insert, but that were panel mount...the hazard switch is like from a Volvo or something....

 

Thanks, Ron. What you posted helped get me started looking.

These give an idea of what can turn out to be a multitude of possibilities for mounting items in this conversion on the lower insert. One thing that will probably need to be done, however, is to develop a way to make some convex bevel washers or trim rings, like under the Rear AC controls, so that some of these kinds of things can be properly mounted in the convex part of the insert. My brain is working on that, but I haven't come up with the method yet.