Derf's 95SC2 Interior Restoration Thread
 

Watched a video by Richpin where he manhandled the **** out of the trim holding up the headliner in a third series S car.

Using a trim removal tool, Phillips screwdriver, t50 bit, straight pick, 80°F, 80% humidity, I did more or less the same damn thing in certain spots removed extra things holding it in that didn't exist anymore in gen 3, flexed the hell out of it to get it out from behind stuff, and

https://cimg7.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.sat...5ddbea9b25.jpg
https://cimg1.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.sat...3b27ca5cdd.jpg

.

I can now recover that after I scrape all the foam off from the previous headliner with I'm not sure what. I don't know what to use as adhesive, because I tried to use spray 3M headliner adhesive to reattach the fabric to the doors, and that only lasted 3 months, partly summer, before it started coming off. Granted that was probably not the right adhesive for fabric to whatever the hell I was gluing it to on the door. This is actually foam fabric to some type of formed compressed fiber board. I'll do some research..

I'm going to have to take the door panels to an automotive upholstery place to get the glue residue out of the fabric itself so that they can glue that to an intermediate piece which then gets glued to the inside of the door panel. I'm hoping they can use the original fabric because there is no way in hell I will find both inner door panels with better fabric from the same dead car that can be switched out.

My garage floor has been epoxied and coated with polyospartic.

https://cimg3.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.sat...fc9e2d9cbe.jpg

Cost too much but I have committed to maintaining the Audi, the Escape, and of course my 95 SC2, which needs new valve guide seals and eventually a clutch. My neck is messed up and I cannot lay on the floor anymore and crane my neck.

I have decided which scissors lift I would like to purchase, but I am finding conflicting information online about the ground clearance of a stock 2016 A3 premium and I don't know where the hell they're measuring from. Probably not the front bumper. My wife is being weird about straddling it while parking with the Escape. That is the obvious solution. Shallow ramps with a gradual rise or the other answer but I don't want to have to get out of the car to put them in place and even if I did then I couldn't close the garage door.

Next comes the intake manifold gasket replacement, the first thing I will do using the lift. The lower studs cannot be accessed from above. I can't even see what they look like and somehow there are multiple designs for 95. I ordered what I thought with the correct parts and have them came as nuts not studs. The top studs are different than the bottom studs. What the ****.

So I have to get it up in the air or crawl the **** under it one last time to make sure I order the right thing this time.

Just did a brake fluid flush on the Audi with a pressurized one man bleeder attached to the master cylinder. Quite easy. Can actually feel a difference in the pedal after only two years and less than 24,000 mi. Really surprised me as it had already been done once since I've owned the car.

Totally off topic.

Summary.: Finally got up the nerve to deal with 27-year-old trim holding up the headliner. It's out, I'm happy, and I have all of you to thank for it. It took this long for me to build up the confidence which is sad but true. And it took 10 minutes and was totally not a big deal in the end, just as Rube said 10 years ago.

I took it for a drive after putting the trim in the garage. It still as much fun as it's always been. It just is.

The garage floor looks great, derf. As for that headliner, I don't know what to tell you to use as an adhesive. I scraped mine with a plastic putty scraper. I'm not sure, but THINK I used about 3 cans of 3M adhesive to install the fabric I used. I don't really remember exactly what I used, but THINK is was a berber carpet piece. I have no idea how long it lasted because I sold it about 2 months later because the crappy TAAT transmission was proving to be a royal pain in the arse. Good job on getting it out without breaking it because I KNOW it took some fanagaling.

When doing something similar to the falling headliner in our van I used a scotch-brite wheel in my drill to buff all that crap off.
It was tedious and messy but got the job done fairly well.

Many thanks for the words of wisdom, sir!

I had 2 old battlewagons a 1979 crown Vic and a 1999 Colony Park! Sold the 79 when it had 279,000, and found the colony park. It was super clean but a drunk hit me in my own driveway, pushed me into a telephone pols at bottom of driveway and blew out the side windows!! Anywho I did the headliner in the 79 while the kids were young, I covered the ceiling with some kids wallpaper that had Disney characters on it! The painter who bought it laughed when he looked up and saw the disney characters!! Go BOLDLY!!