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Page 1 Interior
Page 2 Exterior
Page 3 Links to my other car domain pages
Page 4 Stuff I'm planning on doing.
Page 5 Previous Audio System.
Page 6 Converting of exterior lights to LEDs **Check This Page Out**
Page 7 CAC Mafia Life  Car Audio Central's own Mafia Style RPG. 

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Well this is my 1984 Camaro, bought the car back in 91 and was the first car I ever bought.

The past few years were hard on the car, drove it to work each day. 100 miles a day took it's toll over 5 years.

So now I'm going to start restoring it, and try and make it look new again.

So starting with the interior first.

One of the things I've always wanted to do was to swap out the 84 dash, to one that is a little more modern. So I've finally decided to start this project.

As you can see, the 84 Dash is pretty boring. Plus since this car was a basic , it didn't even have dash vents. You can see where they are suppose to be!!

About 3 years ago, I bought a dash that came out of a 92 Camaro. It's been sitting in the garage ever since, because a. I drove the car everyday, so really couldn't start a big project like this, and b. I was afraid to start a big project like this!

Well since I don't have to drive up to Seattle anymore, and I also bought the 4Runner that I've been driving. I decided to go ahead and start this project.

So Project Dash Swap was started.

Here is the dash pad removed

Now the fun part. Getting the 84 Dash out, this took awhile. Unhooking all the wires, and bolts and everything. Finally got it out.

Once I got this far, I realized that if I want to use the 92 style heater control. I'm going to have to replace my heaterbox, the reason being. The 92 style control is a vacuum style, my old 84 is cable driven. So I got a 92 heater box, and it bolted right up. Now just have to connect the vacuums lines to where they need to go.

You may have noticed I took the carpet out. I decided that since I was this far, I might as well do a full interior restoration. So going to replace the carpet and all the plastics, door panels, seats, everything inside.

I'm really tired of the blue interior, so going to go with a dark charcoal I think. Also going to try and find some leather seats out of a 4th gen Camaro. They just look nicer and more comfortable plus they bolt right up.

So now that I have the heaterbox installed, I was ready to attempt to install the 92 dash. Overall, this wasn't too difficult. The most difficult part was finding wiring diagrams for both the 84 and the 92. But once I was able to obtain these, I was good to go.

Hooking up the dash was pretty straight forward. There is a main harness that comes in through the firewall labeled as C-100. Physically this harness did not change from 84-92. The only difference is the pins/wires may be in different locations. Well all I had to do is, move the pins/wires on the 92 dash, to match where they were on the 84. Then once I did this, I just connected the harness to the harness on the other side of the firewall. Bingo, almost everything worked!! I did have to ground a pin on the cluster. The 84 must not have used a ground here, or something. But once I did that, the entire cluster worked.

So here is where I'm at right now with the 92 dash install. Everything on the Cluster appears to be working.
Here is the new Cluster and dash installed.

Here is what the old cluster looked like.

Here is the new more modern looking cluster installed in the new dash.

This new cluster is so much nicer then the old. Much easier to see at night too, since these are backlit. The old cluster the light only came in around the gages. So it always seemed to be dim, no matter how hight you set the dimmer too. One of my next projects will be to convert this new cluster to LED, to make it even brighter!

So now that I got the dash all working (and the car still runs). I'm moving onto the doors. As you can tell from the pics, I have the basic door. No power mirrors, or windows.
So since I'm going to get new door panels. I might as well convert my manual doors to power. So hopefully by this weekend, the parts I ordered will get here. And I'll be able to start this next project.

11/3/06: Today, I started the swap of manual windows to power windows.
I think it would be a lot easier, if 2 people were working on it. One to hold the glass, and the other to get the regulators in out. But it was just me, so it took awhile, but I did get 1 door done.

Also got the factory wiring for all the doors and ran those too. So everything is going to look factory.

I hooked up the switch, and the window is working great!!!
Need to adjust it a little, but so far I'm pretty happy I did this swap.

I still need to bolt of the power mirror, and hook it up. Once I get the switch it should work too.

Also, since I have all the wiring for the door locks too. Going to hook up my lock actuators to the factory wiring. Get the factory door lock switches and that will be working too!

11/8/06: Got the new heater blower motor installed. This was an A/C blower motor. Because all the wiring I got with the new dash, was from an A/C car. I wanted to hook the blower up, with the factory plugs. My old 84 heater motor was totally different, so out it went and in with the new. I did have to swap out the fan wheel, since the A/C one was longer.

Nice thing about this A/C , it has a 'higher' speed then the non A/C type. I still need to get the high speed replay for it, but once I do. I'll have a fan that blows a little better then what I took out.

11/14/06: Got my power mirror switch today, so hooked it up and the power mirrors work now!

12/28/06: Got my new carpet installed today, the color I chose is 'Graphite' which looks like a real dark charcoal. I really like how it looks. I also replaced one side of the carpet on the center console, and it's a pretty close match to the main carpet. I'm pretty happy with how that turned out too.

If anyone is interested, I got the floor carpet from here .

1/03/07 Well today I applied the sound deadener to the cargo area. I also got my wire and RCA's from KnuKonceptz, and installed all that too. Went with 1/0 gage power wire this time. Stuff is thick!

1/06/07
Well today I was able to get the carpet on the center console and get that reinstalled. Also mounted the power window switches where they would have been from the factory.

1/20/07
Decided to go ahead and try and reupholster the headliner. I've never attempted this before, but thought it might be worth spending $16 to fix it, compared to almost $200 for a new one. After getting done, I think the results were worth it! No wrinkles around the corners, and no more rips or sags!

2/19/07
I got a lot done this weekend. The first goal was to fix my drivers door, that all F-Body owners know will sag!! I purchased this '
Upper Hinge Repair Kit '. For anyone wanting to fix their doors, this is the way to go. I really like these because the new hinges have grease zerks.

The next goal for the weekend, was to get all the plastics reinstalled. I recently changed the color of all the plastics using the SEM Plastic and Vinyl paint. I went with Graphite to match the carpet. The results are great, my plastics panels all look brand new, and match the carpet now.

Since this paint can also be used on fabric. I also went ahead and changed the color of the headliner and rear speaker covers. The light gray just didn't match enough with everything else. Now everything is the same color and I really like it.

3/6/07
Got my door panels today, used the SEM paint on these too. The old color is on the left, and the new color on the right. I really like how these turned out.

3/14/07
Got my outer sweeps today, and installed the passenger side. Door is water tight again, finally after all these years.

I also installed 1 of the door panels, really wanted to see how it looked. The painted panels look great installed.

The door lock switch works too!

Update 11/30/09

I  recently bought a 92 Z28 to use for a donor car, and I decided to pull out the RS dash that I had installed earlier and installed the Z28 dash.   The main differences is,  the Z28 dash had the factory wiring for the fog lights, and I also now have the 145mph speedometer too.

Here are some pics with the 92Z28 dash installed.

Everything works too :)

Keep checking back, to see my progress!!
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Page 1 Interior
Page 2 Exterior
Page 3 Links to my other car domain pages
Page 4 Stuff I'm planning on doing.
Page 5 Previous Audio System.
Page 6 Converting of exterior lights to LEDs **Check This Page Out**
Page 7 CAC Mafia Life  Car Audio Central's own Mafia Style RPG.  Sign up today it's Free!  Let Chrisfromwa know you're from CarDomain and I'll send you some bonus items to get started.