Headliner Rebuild, Should I?

darkstar_one

Registered User
so i pulled off my headliner, needless to say it didnt come out nicely, it kinda bent and cracked and loss some of its material and what not, anywho, should i take it to an upholestry shop and have it redone or get a better one from the local junk yard and re-do that one? thanks.
 
It’s tough to find a good headliner backer, good luck trying to find one. You can repair your old one. Prop it up like it would be in the car and apply some fiberglass resin and cloth to the top side where it is cracked or where you have to patch broken pieces. This will really strengthen it up. Then you can recover it yourself which is not very hard. You can buy a kit or get the headliner mat. at most fabric shops and make sure you use a auto type contact cement, it has a higher temp rating. Or take it to a shop and have them recover it.
 
Ref:the 3m stuff it is fast and sticky, coat both pieces and work quickly it sets fast and sure.
 
I recovered my headliner ('89 Cougar c/w moonroof) and had the same issues. I used 3M Super 77 spray adhesive which worked excellent. I purchased vinyl from a local fabric store and my wife and I glued it onto the old headliner. The results were very good. I tried to reinforce the headliner especially where the moonroof cutout was but did not have much success. This was due to the headliner material flaking, i.e. coming apart in layers.

So

If I was to do it again I would use the old headliner as a form and make a new fiberglass headliner which I would then recover as required. The way the old headliners were made seems pretty poor to me. I doubt mine would survive another removal again, so if it comes out I will be the proud owner of a new fiberglass one.

sean
 
I'm thinking I would use the old headliner as a mold and lay the fiberglass up on it. After I would sand it smooth apply some sound deadener, a layer of thin foam then glue on the vinyl.

The plan seems complete in my mind. Of course the reality may be different remembering I'm no fiberglass technition.

sean
 
Another option would be laun board. lay it out on Luan board( a composited layered plywood about 1/8 thick) cut it and go it is stifff enough to work, and can be wetted and bent into shape after the initial shape is laid out from the pattern.
 
I would think it would be tough to get the shapes proper trying to bend a damp piece of 1/8th board.

We cut panels at our company and I can't see being able to work any kind of panel i.e. fibrex, ply, mdf, pb, to make the nice rounded shapes around the moonroof switch and the moonroof motor. Now if the headliner was at all flat I would have used fibrex for sure.


sean
 
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