Let me introduce myself: I’m a long time geek working in the computer industry on open source software. I spend too much time in front of a computer. Way too much time.
I needed to do something to get away from the computer. Something physical – something to get dirt under my fingernails and sore muscles. Something where you can actually touch and see results at the end of the day.
So I decided to restore a car. [Insert scary music here]
Note: while WordPress puts the most recent posts at the top, you can also read the story in order starting with The Car Shows Up.
I’m moderately proud of figuring out a way to use modern LED technology to replace the 60 year old electroluminescent technology in the HVAC (Heater Ventilation and Air Conditioning) controls. On the other hand, the mounting for the dimmer control for this was not one of my prouder moments…
I had simply zip tied the control module under the dash. In a visible location. Because there wasn’t an hidden place to mount easily it. As I’ve mentioned, for such a large car there is very little space in many areas. Like under the dash.
With the rest of the interior coming together and looking good something had to be done about the HVAC LED dimmer.
When starting the HVAC lighting project I actually ordered two dimmers: a packaged, ready to use unit, and a more compact modular unit that consisted of a 1″x1″ circuit board, connecting cables, and rotary control knob. While I wanted to use the modular unit it was easier to use the packaged unit for prototyping.
The biggest problem, of course, was finding the modular unit. After extensive searching I found it just where it should be – in the box with the rest of the LED components…
You know that old saying if the only tool you have is a hammer, every problem looks like a nail? And my personal favorite: a big enough hammer can drive any screw.
Well, with a 3D printer suddenly any problem looks like something that can be solved with a custom part!
Studying the underside of the dash it looked like the perfect solution would be to extend the custom bracket holding the updated fusebox. I had been wanting to do this anyway – this was the first fusebox bracket I did and the cutout for the fusebox itself had been gouged to “close enough” size with hand tools. Later brackets used laser cut parts from SendCutSend which are a much better fit. And I had an extra blank.
OK, let’s get this party started!
First of all, I wanted the LED to be a bit dimmer than the lowest setting on the dimmer control. I noticed that changing the brightness of the dash lights also dimmed the HVAC LED. Putting on the Electrical Engineer hat that I don’t have, this implies that I can make the dimmer dimmer by adding a resistor to the power supply wire. A 2 ohm or 5 ohm resistor should do the trick. Time to head to Amazon!
Although the LEDs don’t draw much power I was concerned that the widely available (and cheap) 1/2 watt resistors wouldn’t be enough. A bit of searching turned up an assortment pack of 5 watt resistors at a semi-reasonable price.
Without being sure what was needed it made sense to test the resistor circuit before wiring it permanently. Easy enough to do – grab a couple of jumper wires with alligator clips. One wire from power to resistor and the second from resistor to dimmer. Hook it up, wait for night, turn off the workshop lights, wait for darkness, and verify that I had the correct value.
Hmm, not much difference in brightness with the 2.2 ohm… OK, the next size up is 3.3 ohms Still not enough change. Well this is why I got the assortment pack! Grab the 10 ohm. Better, but still not quite what I wanted. 22 ohm? 47 ohm? Finally at 100 ohm it was close to the (lack of) brightness I was looking for.
This was much more resistance than I expected – glad I experimented first! Discussing this later with a friend who is a real electrical engineer, he told me that he sometimes has to go as high as 500,000 ohms in similar circuits. Huh, learn something new every day! Guess I should have tried 1,000 ohm and 10,000 ohm resistors while I was at it.
Now to design the case to hold all of the electrical components. Complex designs are basically a bunch of simple designs connected together. In this case I needed a mount for the circuit board, a holder for the resistor, a baseplate for these, a top plate to provide protection, and four columns to tie everything together.
And that is exactly how I designed it: a mounting plate for the circuit board that picked up the screw holes in the circuit board and was extruded to provide space for the components sticking out of the circuit board. A pair of rectangular pillars with holes for the tubular resistor. These were split in half forming a saddle so that the resistor could be inserted and then firmly clamped in place. Next was the baseplate with both of the mounts integrated into it and round columns at each corner. Finally, a top plate that screwed to the columns and which included the top half of the resistor mount.
Print it out, test fit everything together…. And as usual discover a few things that needed to be tweaked. Absolutely normal. The amazing thing about CAD and 3D printing is that you can do this quickly, easily, and cheaply. For example, these parts used about $0.25 of material.
Dimmer Module Box
With the housing done, turn to the bracket. Remove the original bracket from under the dash and use it as a reference. Decide how much it needs to be extended to support the dimmer box and dimmer knob. Mark this extension as well as the bends for bolting the bracket to the dash on the fuse box bracket panel.
Drilling the mounting holes for the dimmer box was easy – take the top plate and use a transfer punch to mark the center of each mounting hole and then drill them. Determine where the control knob should go and drill a hole for it. Drill a hole for the mounting bolt that will secure the bracket to the bottom of the dash.
Bend the bracket so it will mount properly and weld a nut to it. With an earlier version of the bracket I used a separate nut – trying to hold the bracket and loose nut in position while starting a bolt proved to be a nightmare. Test fit the bracket. It fits, so hit it with a couple of coats of paint.
Really should clean up the dimmer box before final mounting. There are four wires on the dimmer – two for power in and two going to the LEDs. Add these wires, sleeve them, and add a connector to the end. Add a matching connector to the wires in the dash. This will simplify installation and any future maintenance on the dimmer circuit.
OK, to be perfectly honest, I’m turning into an electrical snob as I learn more about wiring.
Dimmer Module ready to install
Bolt the dimmer box to the bracket, mount the control knob in its hole, and we’re finally ready for installation. I had an extra fusebox from another project, so I temporarily mounted it in the bracket to make sure everything fit.
Dimmer Module mounted on bracket with reference fusebox
Moment of truth time: slip the bracket under the dash, position the fusebox in its cutout, and bolt the assembly to the dash. With the mounting bolt secure, run in the four machine screws that fasten the fusebox to the bracket. Plug in the connector for the dimmer module.
Fortunately it was late enough that it was dark. Turn off the workshop lights, turn on the Imperial headlights, and adjust the dimmer knob. Everything worked!
And there was much rejoicing!
The dimmer module is now securely mounted, completely hidden under the dash, yet the control knob can be easily reached to adjust brightness. I’m declaring this a success and moving on to the next project.
With the existing trim around the column between and back doors upgraded and looking good my attention turned to the rear trim pieces. Despite years of searching, I haven’t been able to find any more of the U-shaped spring trim. OK, if I can’t find an exact replacement, could I make something that would work?
Every problem now looks like something that can be solved with a 3D printer. I can’t come up with a way to make the entire clip as a single piece – but what about making a series of 1/2″ or 1″ clips and stringing them together? It! Could! Work!
Fire up Fusion, sketch out a 1/2″x1/2″ U-shaped clip, extend it to 1″ long, knock it out on the 3D printer, and optimistically head to the Imperial.
Where it didn’t come anywhere close to fitting. Not to mention that there is a piece of door weatherstripping right where the clip would go.
OK, time to study this edge of the door opening more closely. Nope, nothing like the edges of the center column. Completely different shape.
Study the situation more closely. There is an L-shaped turned in edge on the door frame with the filler piece fitting inside the L. Dredging up the distant memories of long lost design skills, maybe a piece that locks into place at three points on the profile of the door frame could work? This would cover the top of the frame and extend down onto the filler. With the right design the printed plastic should have enough flexibility to snap into place and enough rigidity to lock into position.
Cross section of rear door with concept for trim retainer
Take a set of measurements across the door frame and filler piece, head back to Fusion, and start to design. The design went surprisingly quickly – leading me to suspect that it wouldn’t work… It is a small part, so it prints out quickly.
Head over to the car and try to snap it in place. It almost works. Which is actually quite encouraging! OK, the top needs to be a bit wider and the throat needs to be a bit deeper.
Fusion is a parametric design system. This means that you can change a design simply by changing dimensions. I was able to modify the design of the clip simply by changing two or three dimensions. And by changing I mean simply selecting a dimension and typing in new numbers – it was literally a 20 second job to change the dimensions and send a new part to the printer. And the new part printed in 7 or 8 minutes.
The new clip was closer but could still be improved. Version 7 of the design was finally the one I wanted. This wasn’t a problem – it was a very common example of the iterative nature of engineering design. The beauty of modern technology is that I was able to go through these 7 iterations an about an hour and a half with little effort!
With a profile that worked the next step was to extend this profile along the door frame – which had a variety of curves. The solution was to create a set of clips in 1/2″, 1″, and 2″ lengths. I then created multiple copies in the printer software and printed out 24 clips as a single job. This took about three hours, so I let it run and came back the next day.
Starting at the top I snapped the clips into place on the door frame, using 2″ clips for the straight sections, 1″ clips for the slightly curved sections, and 1/2″ clips for the most tightly curved sections.
Once again it almost worked. Most of the clips fit fine, but there was one place where they just wouldn’t lock into place. Oh! There is a doubled thickness of sheet metal where two panels meet! Look at what needs to be changed, head back to Fusion, and print off a modified clip. This time it only took me three iterations to get something that worked.
Finally! A set of clips covering the entire edge of the door frame.
The next question is how to wrap them with vinyl? They have to be removed from the door to do this, and 22 loose clips will be a pain to wrestle with. Fortunately two birds could be killed with one stone. I was concerned about the clips printing through the vinyl, and had planned to cover them with 1/4″ foam. By gluing the foam to the clips while they were still on the car they would stay in position while wrapping the vinyl.
Worked like a charm. Glue the foam to the clips, carefully pop the clips off of the door frame, take everything over to the bench, finish gluing, and wrap it with vinyl.
Take it back to the car and carefully snap each clip in place. And Viola! – good looking trim around the back seat!
This is a major change from when I first got the car. The interior has gone from horrible to something I’m reasonably proud of.
A set of fabric covered U-shaped trim pieces hold trim panels to the center pillars of the car. These are in absolutely horrible shape. I’ve been looking for replacements for the last four years with no success. And I’ve been afraid to touch these lest I totally destroy them, leaving me up the excrement waterway without a manual propulsion device.
After finishing the rest of the interior these pieces were really bugging me. With considerable and painful cogitation I dreamed up an almost plausible way to cover them with vinyl.
Original U-channel holding trim panel in place
Yeah, that’s ugly…
Applying a liberal dose of fast setting epoxy to secure my courage in place, I removed the first piece of U-channel and tossed it onto the workbench.
Measurements and careful calculation suggested that a strip of vinyl 2-1/8″ wide would cover them.
Point of no return – carefully cut the cloth covering off of the wire spine. I’m officially committed!
My biggest concern was how to hold the wire spine and vinyl in place while wrapping the vinyl around the U. And how to secure the vinyl cover to the wire spine. The answer, which gave me the impetus to finally start this job, was three steps.
First, make a fixture to hold the vinyl and wire spine. This was done with two pieces of plywood spaced just the right distance apart making a channel for the vinyl and wire spine:
Fixture to support vinyl and wire spine
This holds the vinyl in place, but how to keep the wire spine from moving when I fold the vinyl over the edges? This is the step that kept me from touching these pieces for several years. I have a clear nightmare vision of trying to keep the vinyl centered while wrapping it over both legs of the U as being a a four or five handed wrestling match with a dyspeptic python. While everything is liberally coated with glue.
Thus the second step – run a bead of urethane adhesive down the bottom of the vinyl and bed the wire spine into it. This locks the vinyl and wire spine together.
This made it “easy” to wrap the vinyl into the center of the U – but how to hold it in place once wrapped? The solution was a liberal application of contact adhesive to the vinyl backing and to the wire spine. This is rather weak – the wire spine doesn’t have much surface area to bond to. But it doesn’t have to be strong – it just needs to hold the vinyl in place long enough to install the trim piece. The spring action of the wire spine locks everything into place after installation.
Between the plywood fixture and the urethane locking the spine to the vinyl it was surprisingly easy to smoothly wrap the vinyl into the center of the U. Coat the vinyl backing and the wire spine on one side with contact cement and give it 10 minutes to set up. Start at one end and carefully roll the vinyl over the edge. Every few inches stop and press the vinyl firmly against the wire spine with a plastic body and trim tool. Continue until one side was done, then flip the fixture around and repeat on the other side.
Refurbished U-channel installed
I’m rather pleased with the results. The final outcome is exactly what I was hoping for but didn’t really quite expect when I started this task And there was much rejoicing!
As I’ve mentioned once or twice, I seem to be a glutton for punishment. With the front doors done the difference between the front and rear doors was obvious.
I actually had all of the trim pieces for the rear doors. They were in the trunk of the car when I bought it. After doing the front doors I knew how all of these pieces fit. And how to do a better job of fitting the arm rest.
Sigh.Fine. Pull the rear door cards off the doors. Dig out the aluminum trim panels and chrome trim. Start the process from the middle.
First, cover the aluminum trim panel with vinyl and then fit it and secure it in place.
Fit the arm rest and start adding bolts and sheet metal screws to hold it in place. The bottom of the arm rest was warped, especially on the driver’s side. Screwing it to the door card flattened it out nicely.
Rear door card with insert added. Arm rest is now secured to door card.
Install the updated door cards back on the car, test everything, and rejoice.
Matching front and rear doors
Of course it wasn’t quite as simple as this description might imply… But it did go fairly smoothly and the results were good.
In yet another demonstration of a lack of common sense I decided it was time to tackle the front door cards.
Unlike the replacement hardboard panels on the rear doors, the front doors still had the factory door cards. These were made from a cardboard like compressed paper material. Which was fragile when new. It doesn’t age well. If exposed to water it basically falls apart. I’ve been afraid to touch it…
But the job has to be done. Sometime. Sigh, it looks like sometime is now….
Pop the first door card off and plop it on the workbench. Carefully take the arm rest off. The Imperial has a trim piece directly above the arm rest – an aluminum sheet with a sort of floral pattern and a chrome plated metal surround. This was also carefully removed.
Original front door card
The first view of what we have to work with is a bit of a mixed bag:
Front Door Card, arm rest and trim panel removed.
The first thing you can see is the (f)ugly carpet along the bottom of the door. This absolutely has to go. What was Chrysler thinking???
The second is that the door card is molded – you can see how the trim panel is partially recessed. This means that you will have trouble fitting things back together if you replace the factory panel with a flat piece of hardboard. This explains some of the challenges I had with the rear door cards. OK, I really need to save the factory pieces.
Time to carefully peal the old vinyl and carpet off. A heat gun softens the old adhesive and minimizes damage.
Front Door Card stripped
I’ve seen worse… It is actually in reasonably good shape except for the holes around the edges for the mounting clips. If I’m careful installing it should be OK.
The initial steps are like the rear door cards: cut and fit 1/4″ SewFoam to go over the whole panel. Double stitch the foam to the vinyl in 6″ squares – making sure that they line up with the stitching on the back doors. Spray the door card and cover with spray adhesive, fit the cover to the door, and staple on the back. The fit around the molded indents wasn’t great – but the arm rest and trim panel would pull everything into place.
The first major difference is the aluminum trim panel. These were worn and dirty. And ugly from the factory. Again, what was Chrysler thinking? I considered covering them with a nice walnut veneer. This would look rich – it was what Chrysler should have done in the first place.
I ultimately decided to just use some of the darker vinyl – I was already using it other places for accent. A round of spray adhesive, some fitting and trimming, and the updated trim panels were ready to go.
On the rear door cards the mounting of the arm rest and trim panels was a mystery. On the front doors taking them apart showed all of the mounting hardware and tricks.
First was to position the aluminum trim panel and the chrome trim. The chrome trim had a series of “nails” sticking out the back when went through holes in the door card and were then bent over. The arm rest used a combination of nuts and bolts, sheet metal screws, and the “nails”.
There was a bit of fiddling to deal with the thicker foam backed vinyl, but everything eventually went together. The last step on the workbench was to carefully install the retaining clips around the edge.
Time to cross my fingers, cart the refurbished door card over to the car, and attempt to install it. After a few gyrations the door card clipped into place. Install the courtesy light into the door and verify that it works. So far, so good. The last step was to install the power window switch and see if the window still goes up and down.
The window goes up. The window goes back down. The window goes up again. The door closes. The door opens. The door closes again. And there was much rejoicing!
Spend a few minutes admiring my work. Then on to the remaining door.
Front Door Card finished
I’m rather happy with how this turned out! The old fiberboard held up better than I expected. The trim panel above the arm rest adds a nice bit of contrast. Walnut would have been nicer, but this is fine. This task went better than I expected going into it – always good when that happens! I’m beginning to look forward to cruise nights this summer.
With a conceptual design for a Wizard Staff in hand the next step was to prepare a budget proposal for a 3D printer and submit it to my CFO. Or, to put it differently, tell She Who Must Be Obeyed that I need a Bambu X1C 3D printer for my projects. The response was “how much is it and will it do what you need?” Answer: “yes, it does what I need. And it is on sale right now.” Her response: “OK. Order it before the price goes up.” What did I ever do to deserve this lady?
As I may have previously mentioned I am an engineer and I am artistically declined. So I started searching for 3D models. Wanted something better than a ball glued to the end of a stick. Couldn’t find a good cobra head but I did find a dragon paw and a Gandalf staff from Lord of the Rings. Grab both models and print small versions of them – small versions to minimize the amount of printer filament used.
Small 3D prints of potential staff heads.
The Gandalf staff has a kind of basket to hold the orb. The description recommends starting the print, stopping it half way through, inserting an orb, and then finishing the print. This works but makes it difficult to change or work on the orb.
The dragon paw is available with or without the orb. You can print it without the orb and insert the orb later. And there is a design for the orb that splits the orb into two halves with a separate structure that holds the two halves together and provides support for LEDs.
I rather like the way the dragon paw looks. And I can definitely design a sphere! So let’s start off by building a prototype based on the dragon paw and an orb that contains programmable LED strips.
As a side note there are a huge number of 3D models that people share. These can be printed directly or modified. The dragon paw model I’m starting with is the Orb in Dragon Claw model posted on Thingiverse by Argasman. This model is licensed under the Creative Commons – Attribution license, which means that I’m free to use the model as long as I give credit to Argasman.
My old engineering manager from the days when I was designing jet fighters had a standard response to any idea or suggestion: “show me the drawing”. His position was that you did not actually have anything worth discussing until you could show at least a sketch.
And he was right. Words and word pictures are just the beginning of an engineering design. They are, at best, the parameters of a design. Until you have a drawing – at least a sketch – you don’t have anything real.
Creating a drawing makes you think things through. The initial sketch isn’t a finished design. Engineering design is an iterative process. It starts with a rough concept that goes through multiple stages of changes. Hopefully these changes are improvements and refinements.
Conceptual design for wizard staff
The goal of an initial design, often called a conceptual design, is to quickly explore multiple alternatives, to identify major subsystems, and to allow you to begin the process of breaking an overall design down into individual pieces that can be worked on.
You usually build prototypes of your design. This is important in the early design phases to make sure that your ideas actually work. It is also important later in the design to make sure that all of the pieces actually fit together.
The most critical part of the Wizard Staff is the orb. If we can build a good orb and attach it to the staff the project will be successful.
We’ve got our starting point: build a prototype of the orb and how it will be attached to the staff. There are several sub-goals for this prototype:
Make something that looks good. The staff must both look good and work well.
Make something that works. Whatever we come up with will ultimately be stuck on the end of a stick, waved around, and abused. It must be strong enough to survive routine handling.
Prove the core technology. Use LED strip lights to create a dynamic light show inside the orb and possibly inside the body of the staff. If we can’t build something exciting there is no point going any further.
Build a structure that will support the LED strips inside the orb and let us work on them. This is important while building the orb and for later maintenance and improvements.
Conceptualizing a Wizard’s Staff, the first element is an orb – a ball or crystal, probably 4″-6″ across. These commonly glow when getting ready to cast a spell and then go dark again after the spell has been cast.
This is how most Wizard’s Staffs are built – some LEDs inside a ball that can be turned on and off.
We can do better than that! A 4″ or larger ball has plenty of space to hold LED strip lights. Using LED strip lights we can achieve a wide range of effects: glowing, different levels of brightness, changing colors. We can even implement patterns, effects, and shows – think MegaTree in a ball! We can build “magic spells” that power up and have special effects when “cast”. Hmm, if we are going to do that we really need to add sound effects… This goes beyond any of the examples I’ve been able to find online.
With an idea of how to build an orb, the next question is how to hold it. Possibilities include just attaching it to the end of the staff, a shepards crook, a basket of some sort, a cobra head, or a dragon paw.
Which leaves the tiny little question of how to actually build it. Just a minute – this is the sort of thing that 3D printers are made for! I’ve wanted a 3D printer for years, but kept putting off getting one because I didn’t have a project that would use it. I know myself well enough to know that I need something to utilize a new tool immediately; otherwise it will just sit around gathering dust.
A 3D printer backed by a machine shop combined with MegaTree lighting technology driven by my warped little mind and aided by a (equally warped) electrical engineer should be able to pull this off! This is where you channel Dr. Frankenstein from Young Frankenstein:IT! COULD! WORK!
If we are going this far, what else can be included?
If an Arduino controller is going to be used we can have multiple interactive and dynamic “spells”. This means that we need to design at least 3 “spells” and have a user interface for selecting spells as well as casting them.
If we are going to power up and cast spells with the orb, what about having clear sections of the staff itself that have lighting effects – power running up the staff and into the orb? I haven’t seen that done before and it could be quite interesting.
Sound is clearly a requirement. So controllers and speakers must be integrated into the design.
Can we build a laser into the staff? What about throwing fireballs?
This is looking like it is going to need a lot of power. Definitely more than a couple of AA batteries can handle. The body of the staff should have enough volume for the needed batteries but we are going to have to design a real power subsystem.
This is going to be a true design and build project. One with artistic, engineering, construction, hardware and software elements. Will the results be magic or a let down? I dunno; going to have to build it to find out!
My newest project really needs an introduction and some background. You have been warned!
As the MegaTree neared completion I was thinking about other things that could be be done with this computer controlled lighting technology. Leading to a conversation with a friend and fellow engineer – and potential co-conspirator. He happens to be an Electrical Engineer with extensive experience designing and building micro-controller base systems, both hardware and software. He is also fairly serious about Halloween.
We began discussing how to build a Harry Potter Dementor: Flowing, filmy fabric illuminated with ultraviolet LEDs to make a glowing, moving phantasm. Hmm, it would be much more interesting if it could actually move. What about building a Dementor on a stick mounted on a remote controlled wheeled platform? We could build in a variety of effects and have it chase people!
There are drawbacks to a Dementor on a stick: it would have limited mobility. It would be top heavy and tend to fall over. And it wouldn’t be that realistic.
Building on the challenge of how to move a Dementor we considered the Dementor itself: largely a gauzy, filmy body with some structure. This could be very light. Hey, what about a Drone Dementor? Hang a fabric body from a drone. Use UV sensitive fabric and mount LEDs on the drone. This would be a true flying Dementor that could be as scary as we wanted!
She Who Must Be Obeyed weighed in: “No”. Oh well, a drone with enough carrying capacity for a Dementor would be a bit expensive anyway.
OK, back to the drawing board. We were past Halloween anyway, so this project wasn’t needed until next year.
What else would be good for Halloween? Well, skeletons are popular. Just a minute – what about getting one of the dog skeletons and making a robot dog! Making it walk would be a lot of work, but putting it on a remote controlled wheeled platform would be fairly straightforward and would be fairly realistic at first glance. Especially in the dark coming out from the bushes. Unlike a Dementor, dogs travel on the ground so stability wouldn’t be a major problem. Size and weight of motors, controllers, effects, and batteries wouldn’t be an issue.
Making the jaws move should be easy. We could probably articulate the neck, at least enough to raise the head for howling. My co-conspirator wanted the dog to sit. I roughed out a concept for a framework to support the skeleton that had joints for sitting. Sound effects would be required – at a minimum barking, howling, and growling.
Of course glowing red eyes are a given!
At this point She Who Must Be Obeyed provided further guidance: “NO. You will not traumatize small children. You will not chase Trick or Treaters. No scary robot dogs.” Some people just don’t know how to have fun…
What else could be done? Ponder, ponder, ponder…
Keeping to the theme of building something supernatural that uses technology to build magical effects – what about magic itself? What about something to cast magical spells? A magic wand is too small to build much into, but what about a Wizard’s Staff? One with a glowing orb? And potentially other accessories.
This could be an interesting build. And it was approved by She Who Must Be Obeyed.
Hopefully this will be the last post on the courtesy light electrical gremlins. It looks like there were two independent – and intermittent! – problems: prongs in the light socket touching the shell and a door switch not long enough to function reliably.
In the last post I described insulating the light socket to prevent potential shorting. A shim on the door provided a temporary fix to the door switch problem.
For a permanent fix I ordered a pair of door switches from Rock Auto. When installing them I replaced the bullet connector on the end of the wire just to be sure. And… The door wouldn’t close. The new door switches were too long. Crud!
When I had described the problem on Garage Journal several people had claimed that door switches were adjustable – the shaft could be extended. The Rock Auto switches weren’t adjustable – but the original factory switches were!
Of course the adjustment on the factory switches was frozen. Nothing that a vise, various tools, and strong language couldn’t overcome! With the shaft extended to what looked like a reasonable length there was nothing left but to screw it in place, hook it up, cross my fingers, and close the door.
Success! The switch now works reliably when opening and closing the door!
With two independent problems fixed I hope this problem is fixed for good! Time will tell…
Introducing the Imperial Deathstar, a black 1963 Chrysler Imperial. This is one of the largest production sedans ever built, and arguably the best luxury car of its day.
Join me what will probably be a never-ending saga of grease, aching muscles, and an empty wallet as I work to restore this over 50 year old survivor to a reliable cruiser.
