MADMODS-Team Solstice

Interior:  Leather - Carbon- Alcantara

My interior was black leather when I got the car. I based the interior after current supercars and some concept cars. I got rid of all the cheesy chrome in the car. Some of the chrome got sandblasted and painted dull alumunim. Make sure you adjust your sandblaster pressure lower or you will ruin your parts. An old hot rodders trick is to sand the chrome with steel wool and wd40. It gives it a billet look.  Interior pieces got wrapped in buggati tan italian soft leather and I added some ostrich highlights. The rear behind the seat got a diamond pattern in beautiful alacantra. The tunnel between the seats got wrapped in alacantara. I ditched the stock seats for some carbon fiber ones.

  

 

 

The style was influenced by the new  Buggati Veryon roadster. I added the carbon fiber and billet to make it my own style. This 1.5 million dollar supercar is amazing. I have yet to see the roadster live on the road. I have seen the coupe though.

 

 The rear panel pieces got wrapped in buggati tan leather with stitching accents. Don't let the colors fool you. It's the same material with the camera flash turned off in the second pic. It actually looks like the first pic in real life.

      

Heres a good example of the stitching. The rear speaker got replaced with a infiniti omega speaker. The inner piece is ostrich.

     

I dug ostrich ever since I saw it on a hotrod. The hotrod had black ostrich  accents and looked very cool. Here is a million dollar Pagini Zonda carbon fiber roadster with the interior in yellow ostrich. The yellow is not my cup of tea though. You can get ostrich in several colors. Here's the Zonda roadster:

Heres a pic of the ostrich I ordered.  Its the same color as the leather on my car.

                             

Interior: Dash

The dash got the backside covered in dynamat extreme. One of the goals was to make the inside of the car as quiet as possible. The dash was then fully wrapped in tan leather.The dash had some vent holes that were shaved and covered up to give it a cleaner look.

     

The dash looks good with the audi TT rings and the hummer rings on the A/C controls.

 

                                                  

 This is the backside of the dash. It might be pretty anal here putting dynamat back there, but the difference is quite noticeable.

 

Interior: Gauges

 I have designed a few gauge faces my car. Blackcat customs made the dashes for me.

Yanked the old gauges out, and replaced them with the new ones.

 

  

Interior: Carbon Fiber parts

The carbon parts are beautiful. I had a ton of carbon fiber cloth laying around, so I made everything I could. What I couldn't make, was sent out to Aspisusa in New York for custom wrapping. Aspis makes custom work to order. They do carbon fabrication, carbon wrap and hydrographic wrap. They also supplied me with a carbon fiber corvette wheel.

 

Here is the piece below the handbrake. A custom ostrich pad was made on top of it, and I added a ostrich  hand brake cover.

                                     

Interior: Door Panels

Here is the door panel. These got the insides coated with dynamat extreme, oem speaker grille cut out and rewrapped in leather. The bottom pattern was influenced by lamborghinni.  Full carbon inserts replace oem pieces with an added ostrich insert. I added a billet piece near the door handles and a speaker grille for the replacement speakers.

   

Interior: Carbon fiber seats

 

      

The Tillet Carbon fiber seats are made for a lotus exige/elise. They were shipped down from the UK. They are so light, I can pick them up with two fingers.You will notice that i changed the bottoms out quite a bit till I got a pattern I liked. I made seat patterns out of cardboard, then transferred to thin plastic sheet.  The plastic was then padded and wrapped in leather and ostrich.

               

 

 

 I finally settled with this bottom seat pattern which was influenced by the ccx and spyker supercar. The bottom got a diamond stitch pattern in alacantra. The top pads got wrapped in buggati tan leather. 

  

The top seat patterns were influenced by the koenigsegg CCR and the MTM Audi R8.

         

The biggest issue with aftermarket seats is losing the airbag usage and a check engine light due to the airbag. I actually took the airbag sensors out and transferred them to my new seats.

                        

I cut out different plastic shapes out, then picked out a look I liked. I glued foam on the plastic shapes and shaved the lines clean. Since the seat is not flat and a bit curved, the plastic parts got heated up with a heat gun and taped around a curve drum to warp them a bit. This allowed me to get that concave shape.

             

The piping didn't work for me, so I removed it and wrapped the seats myself. Only way to do things right is do it yourself. A dvd on ulphostery helped alot. I also took a class at Sema from Ish at westcoast customs.

                                      

The seats are glued then clamped on till the glue cures, The side of the seats needed inserts. I made some from cardboard and transferred the shapes to plastic.

                                         

                                         The inside patterns were wrapped in ostrich. The outside one will be wrapped in alacantara. 

                                        

                                                       Here is the insert on the seat.

                                                  

Interior: Power seats + frame construction

The solstice seats are manual, and I wanted some power seats. Everything is possible.  I got some flat bar and channel to make some seat frames. I cut the metal to shape and added some power seat motors I found at a hot rod shop. They add a little weight, but the car is my daily driver and not a stripped down racing car. I wanted comfort this time around. The seats have 6 positions, tilt forward and back, up and down, and front and rear.

               

                    Seats mounting holes were measured. Measure twice, cut once. 

                                            

           The top mounting bars were slotted on the mill to give me extra adjustment.

I traced the stock seats bolt pattern on a piece of wood, then I laid the channel across it and the crossbars. Greg at parkerracing then welded up the frame.  The power seat motor will sit on this frame.   

                                                                                                                                                                                                    

                                           

A frame was also built to connect the seat frames to the power motor. A couple of flat bars were cut to bolt the seat to the motor frame.  Frames were sent off for sandblasting and powder coating in black.   

                                                                                                  

  

Interior: Floor mats

The Momo floor mats are cool, but do not fit good. I ended up using a table jig saw and cutting them to size.

 

 Interior: Steering wheel

 No one makes an aftermarket wheel with a airbag. I found out corvette wheels fit! A corvette aftermarket Aspis wheel bolted right up. The carbon fiber theme worked perfectly. I dyed the ends and the airbag to match the leather. The carbon fiber is a perfect match for the rest of the interior.

 

Interior: custom lit wind deflector

 Windrestrictor built this custom illuminated windscreen for me. If you have a convertible contact them. They can put any logo on there and light them up. They can also wire them to go red when ou hit the brake pedal. They have made some real cool ones. I wired it to an on/off button that is always hot. That way I can light it with the keys out of the car. It has a on\off pushbutton on the dash.

Windrestrictor made me this custom one that says madmods with flames for the fast & furious movie.  The movie will use it for the extra features when the dvd comes out.

                             

 

I actually have a few of them. It takes minutes to change them. Heres the latest ones in green:

   

Interior: Shift knob project

 I changed the shift knob to one that lights up and tells you what gear your in. I also got rid of the stock shifter and had a custom one made by JPM.

 

The custom shift boot was made out of ostrich as well as the handbrake cover.

Interior: custom led shift ring

Audi aftermarket makes a lighted ring for their tt shifter, so I stoled their ideal for my car. The bottom ring had the inside ring glued to it and then filled with filler. The led ring was then placed on the inside of it and glued in. The audi ring bolts into the leds. It took me forever to get the bodywork right on such a small piece.

 

Interior: Audi type ac rings + Hummer H2 rings

 Since I was using an audi TT shifter ring, I also hijacked a set of audi TT ac-vent rings. I took them apart and sanded down an internal ring with a belt sander. I then glued then glued them on.

The hummer uses the exact same A/C controls as the solstice. I found these chrome ring that go around the control knobs. I sandblasted them to match the rest of the rings. I also slotted a spot on them to let the arrows show through.

 

Interior: Custom gauge pods

No one makes a gauge pod for the solstice yet, so I tried out  a bunch of different car models. The 3 gauge pod is too large and blocks the onstar mic. I really needed 3 gauges, so I made a custom one for the passenger side. It faces me perfect, and since its nearby and is digital, it is easy to read. I ended up just molding the gauge pods into the pillars.

 Here is the finished product. Wrapped in carbon fiber

  

Interior: Sunvisors

The sunvisors got wrapped in leather. I replaced the drivers side sunvisor  which had a mirror with another passengers side that did not have a mirror so I could add my own custom mirrors. I found these cool porsche boxer mirrors on ebay. I grinded the back tabs off to make a flat surface and used a glue gun to glue them down.

 

 

Interior: Sound deadning

The interior was completed stripped to the bare metal. I stripped out and discarded all the oem cheap sound barrier. The whole interior got a combo of dynamat extreme, dynapad, and dynaliner. I wanted the interior to be as quiet as a mercedes, and make the new Alpine imprint system sound good.

                               

      

 The inside of the door even got dynamat extreme. I then dynamated the outside of it.

 

Interior: Speaker, headunits, woofers

The plan here was to hide all the electronics where ever I could find room. The car does not have alot of space in it. The stock radio was replaced with a alpines new double din dvd w505 player. I am also using alpines new imprint sound manager. There is no room behind the stock radio, so you have to cut the plastic behind the dash it to fit in the wires and accessories. The ipod stays in the glovebox. I wired in the GMOS Lan04 to keep the onstar working, a Pac-swi box   keeps the steering wheel controls working and a Pac-7 box to allow the dvd to work while driving, by tricking the stock system. I used a alpine KCE cable and usb cable for both Ipods. A alpine NVE 872 Navagation system is wired in behind the drivers seat. Used a ALP1 to change from XM to Siruis.I replaced the stock rear speakers with infinity's best 4" speakers. Since I cut the cheap oem grills off, I made some and glued them in. J&L subs handles the bass. Alpine pdx amps kicks the three subs. Infinity 6" supplys sound at the doors and tweeters.

 

 I cut out an extra hole out for the dual subs. I will be using two jl subs behind me, and one in the passenger floor well.

 

Interior: Sub illumination

 I added plexiglass rings aroung the sub grills so I could illuminate the subs to match the shifter ring.

 A little trick I learned from Remy at Unique whips was to sand the plexiglass. It helps illuminate the rings better.

 

 

Interior: Custom front sub

. Compression racing made me this front mount sub box. I'm about to wrap it in leather.

  

 I love the way the elises have that sub-box in the passenger footwell. It throws the bass where you want it. In your face.

 

I was able to hide the Alpine HD radio and siruis units in the back out of the way.

 

 

Interior: Security

If you modify your car, your first buy should be an alarm. Don't go cheap here. I used vipers (dei) new 5002 alarm. I added 2 pain generator sirens, a backup siren, an extra shock sensor for the trunk, a glass breakage mike, and a radar(proximity) sensor. That with the onstar lojack should keep the car mine. 

This is the piece underneath the handbrake. It is the perfect place for the motion detector on the alarm.  To get the alarm proximity unit in there, I am going to cut some of the plastic ribs out.

                               

 I used dykes to cut out the ribs. The piece is then duct taped in there. Thats the secret here, hide everything and make it look stock.

 

Interior: Wiring + Battery

Monster wire and power fused distrubutor boxes were laid out throughout the car to power items during the build. Notice that the distrubutor box has fuse throughout it.

A yellow top Optima is a must these days.

 

Interior: custom led mirrors

 My new project is a set of led turnsignals for the solstice mirrors. I ordered some solstice mirror covers from kappashere. I ordered some led mirror covers for a uk ford escort to hijack the ledturnsignals. I took the leds and plastic lensce cover off, and used a heat gun to warp them to fit the solstice mirrors. The wires will run down. While I'm at it, I will also add led turn signals arrows to the inside so drivers can see me from behind.

  

Brakes: Rotors & pad swap

 Tri-net rotors, hawk pads help slow down the solstice. Future  plans will include 13" rotors with comp k 8 piston calipers. It takes cash to do these mods, and I'm tired of robbing these banks around here.

                                      

Suspension: Airbag project

Easystreet air rides picked me up as a sponsor. We are the first solstice using their high performance kit. The tank they sent me is too big to fit anywhere. The other tank was too small. I finally found a larger tank, and mounted it on to a piece of sheetmetal.

    

The tank was then mounted to the area where the stock exhaust was. There is a huge opening there. I ended up also mounting the solenoids, and compressor there.

 

 

 

The airbags needed custom mounts made to fit the solstice, and then they got polished. It took awhile to find the right size of airbag for the rear.

          

 
                              The airbags were mounted on the solstice.

                    

 

I was able to drop the car to the ground.

 

 

Here is the car lifted.

 

Wheels:

 

Bought these Asusa's 20's: Got the tires mounted. I went with Nitto's 275 in the rear, and 245's in the front.  I then washed and degreased the wheels for sanding.

 

I wet sanded the wheels using 500 grit and a bucket of soapy water. The sanding knocks down the shine and promotes adhersion for the paint.

                               

The rims were then rinsed with water and left to dry out. After they dried I started masking the rims for paint.

                                       

Masking the rims takes forever. Take your time. Rome wasn't built in a day.

        

Rims were painted satin black.

 

Cargo Rack:

Adding this little rack to the back to give me a bit more cargo space since the trunk is loaded with electronics.

First the pattern is taped down to the trunk:

The trunk is then marked for drilling and hit with a center punch. Then a small hole is drilled followed by drilling with a unibit.

Area is then de-burred.

The back rubber pattern is then layed out. This will protect the finish of the car from getting scratched. The back peeling is removed and it is stuck on to the rack.

 

The backing is clamped down whi.le the glue cures. The rack is then mounted on the car.

 

 Suspension: Body bracing

               Up in back I added a DDM rear strut brace and a kappashere brace. To get both to fit, I plasma cut some of the ends of the ddm brace. This ties the struts together in the back and stiffens the rear.

                             

 

DDM came out with a body brace that replaces the transmission panel. It is much thicker then the stock piece.

 

I layed the piece on the ground and added a layer of dynamat extreme to the top of it to further cut road noise.

  

 

Heres some more pics:
 
 
Our car clubs invade the Vegas strip. We had 50 skys and sols cruising down the strip.