I am restoring an 88 Camaro for my granddaughters first car. The material on the iiner door panels is in good shape but the backing boards are pretty bad. Does anyone know where I can get new backing boards or the board material that I can cut out the shape myself? The boards are about 1/16th or 3/32nds thick. I have checked local hardware retailers but they don't have anything thinner than 1/4 inch thick panels. Thanks for any help or suggestions.

Paul

 

Home Depot sell some cheap fiberboard paneling which is about 1/8" thich and might work out for you. Might want to give it a coat of paint on both sides as it does not like getting wet.

 

Forgot to mention, they also sell sheets of plexyglass and lexan which are even thinner and stronger and can be cut fairly easily with a jig with a fine toothed blade. Used the lexan to redo backing for the door panels on an old Mercedes covertible that got flooded out. Much cheaper than buying new stuff.

 

Classic Industries, Year One, etc all carry new ones if you want to go the other route

 

Thanks for the input. I did get panels at Home Depot. They are 1/8th inch thick which I think is just a little thicker than the originals. The suggestion about using Lexan was good, but there is a material strip which needs to be stiched around the bottom. And I don't think that would have worked out with the lexan.

 

you should make an DIY article about that, sounds like some good info you guys got

 

nj85z28 Thinks I should do a DIY artiicle detailing my work redoing these door panels. I just got the new panels yesterday so I haven't done any work yet. I will take pictures as I get work done and find somewhere on the internet to post them for anyone who is interested to see. It should be a pretty straightforward job. Remove the material from the old panels and trace the shape of the old panels onto the new ones. Then cut out the new panels and smooth the cuts. The new boards have a white coating on one side. Before mounting the material onto the new boards I will probably coat the back sides and edges with polyurethane or something similar to make them as waterproof as possible. There is a strip of vinyl material which will need to be sewn around the bottom edge of the panels. I will have to talk to a fellow I know who does upholstery work to see if he can do that. The only problem I can see that might pop up is because these panels are a little thicker than the originals there might be a problem with the door mounting clips due to the extra thickness. I might have to shave the panels a little around the clip mounting holes. When I start loading pictures I will post the site address.

Paul

 

yes exactly i want alot of pictures so we can put up a DIY on this. i think it's a great thing to know how to do and to share with other camaro enthusiasts.