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SCJEEPER'S Build to Now!

Well the Jeep looks sad sitting out in the parking lot getting poured on. I definately have to spend some more time lining up the windshield and door hinges for the doors to work easily. I wont get to do it tonight because I have to go straight home and keep the little one while Jess is at open house for her school. Probably not a bad idea to have a break anyway. It will definately be a little damp on the inside after sitting outside all day due to the doors not being right but it is not like it has never been wet before. I talked to Jeremy this morning and he pointed out that my Jeep will see more rain today than his has since he repainted it a year and a half ago. It must be nice to have a garage! Here are some more progress pics for you. I'll take some better when i can get the battery charged in the real camera but I am using my BB right now.
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Temps below 60* at night make a old soft top no fun to try to stretch out. It is supposed to be in the upper 70's here today so I am going to let it cook in the parking lot today so it should be a little more plyable this afternoon when I work on it. Does anyone know how to sew clear vinyl? The fabric on the top is in really decent shape but I am wondering if the windows are going to be worth the work of trying to clear up. My windows look they are glued in or melted in or something weird into the fabric. You can see how tight it is my the middle bow in the picture above.
 
I have tried sewing tops in the past and found dental floss to work best, for a window I have used a hot needle to put a whole in the window before running the floss through. Yours is way to nice for a frankentop though, and doing it yourself with floss will leave it 'distressed' looking even if you color match when you are done.

I had a woman in my club restitch my blue half cab for me because the stitching had decayed away. She is/was a professional seamstress though and has her own garage business making custom tops for rock buggies so she has the equipment. In my case she didnt have to do the windows though. Point being, maybe you can find a local upholstery shop that could do it for you.
 
Thanks for the heads up. I have a friend that has an upholstry that does custom interiors for hotrods so maybe he can help me out. The fabric is just in too decent of shape to toss and there is no way that I can drop 800 bones for a bestop especially in black which I dont want and to get a top from the new BD Company would be like 1500 after shipping and everything. It looks like this winter even though I don't want to I will be running the half hard top and full steel doors once I get them painted shortly. In the short term i did get the windows "clearer" using mineral spirits to clean them and i am going to try polishing them to see if they will come out anymore.
 
Meguiars makes a great plastic polish system.

I have found in cold weather, putting a small space heater inside the cab can get it up to 90* inside pretty quick, makes the top easier to stretch on. I am convinced they shrink as they age.

An idea- if you have to replace the windows, cut along the fabric, and then have the new window sewn in with a zipper, just a little bigger and on the inside. The zipper won't show, and the windows would be removable.
 
That is a great idea Randy. I talk to a guy that runs a detail shop and he told me about the meguiars polish too. He said to put a sheet down on smooth concrete, stretch the top out, apply the polish then go to town with an orbital buffer. He said to do the worst spot first and if it makes a change on that then the rest of the top should be a cake walk. One of the ladies here at work has a husband that does car restoration and they have an industrial sewing machine for making repairs and stuff and she said that I was more than welcome to try to fix it will that.
 
Well picked out the colors for the 82 stripe package that my little brother is going to make for me. He took some pictures and now he is going to do his thing on the computer and get them drawn up before he orders the vinyl. Light brown metallic and brass metallic are the two colors that I am using. They are almost a perfect match to the two colors in my seats. It will probably be a couple or few weeks before this little project is done. He said that he wanted to give the paint time to cure completely before applying the vinyl. I do still have somewhat of a gremlin in the dash.....imagine that right?! Nothing more that taking it back off and verifying everything is right. I am certain that it is a grounding issue though. I think that I have heard someone on here grounding straight to the battery. Is that a possible solution?
 
Small update....after much help from the fellas on here I seem to have the dash problem worked out but still fighting with the heater switch not working. Hoping to get that fixed tonight with a new switch so we'll see. We are riding with the club to Helen, GA this weekend. Anyone local out to meet us there. Hopefully we will have 20 or so jeeps convoying down the highway to GA. I have the get the heater fixed for the misses since it will be cool in the morning. it is going to be great riding weather Saturday...may even get warm enough to remove the doors for a little while hopefully. I still do not have my hard doors painted yet but I have started tearing them down. ALL the seals are completely shot so there goes another 300 bucks. You gotta pay to play right?!
 
Well dash is complete put back together and everything is working properly. Looking forward to some seat time with Jess this weekend on the cruise to Helen , ga. My parents are keeping the baby for us and we r going to be gone all day. I'll post up pics wen we get back.
 
Have fun. Congrats on getting the dash done. Want to do mine now? ;-)
 
Well here are some pics from the Ride last Saturday. Sorry it took so long i have been out of town on business.
Some Pics of the tire swing back on first.
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My cousin Sammy (literally 3 days back from the sandbox for over a year) and his wife, me and Jess in the middle, and my sis Julie and her step son on the right
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Great looking Scrambler. I am pretty jealous right about now.

Any chance that pic in front of the store fronts is near the Gaffney Outlet Mall? I live in Rock Hill and drove by a place like that the other weekend.
 
no where close to gaffney man. This was just across the GA line on 76 I think.
 
Hey, what is that "puck" that is on the front passenger side fender flare? Is that a roll of electrical tape, a hockey puck, or a GPS/Satalite receiver?
 
Forgot to add the most important part...KICKASS Ride!!! Looks awesome :)
 
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