Low-Buck Celica Interior Restoration

[Raforty]

Celica Interior Reborn

When I began restoring my wife’s Celica RA40 Liftback, I was starting with an awful interior. Interior plastic panels were disintegrating into powder – literally – and a lot of the original colour impregnated into the material had been bleached out as well.

After many trips to the wrecker’s where a number of Celicas were then available, I chose the best interior parts and panels I could find. Some were in blue (my car’s interior colour) and some in black or tan.

I would need to paint them to match my interior, but this would require a panel beater mixing some special, colour-matched paint. I also needed to re-paint my faded blue panels. Since I was doing a very low-buck restoration, I decided to find the closest available blue out of a spray can. I found a medium-blue, gloss, spray enamel and bought several cans.

I sprayed one thin coat first, then another. The colour on the surface became brighter, and by varying the thickness and number of coats, I was able to colour-match the finish on several panels, all from different coloured interiors. The blue I had chosen was a gloss enamel colour, so it would cover the surface and fill in any imperfections.

The interior plastics all had a leather-grain surface texture, so it was important not to fill the texture in with too much enamel ‘body’. My technique was very forgiving. If I found myself with a spray coat too thick and heavy, the ‘pooling’ of the paint was quickly repaired. While still wet, I dabbed the excess off with a clean, lint-free rag, or I used that most flexible of tools, the human fingertip. Just a series of light touches was enough to remove the excess. Then a light spray almost immediately over the area, while the underlying paint was still wet, was enough to hide the error. All the wet paint flowed together, then dried together and became uniform.

I had now achieved two things:

a. I had introduced a new coating that would protect the plastic panels from further UV-caused surface disintegration; and

b. I had colour-matched and freshened the interior.

And I had done this for next to no cost.

Mind you, the blue was brighter in hue than the factory’s more subdued, darker shade. But it was close, and it made the interior less shaded. I call it ‘Heightening Reality’.