Classic Corvette Interior - Reconsidering Your Line In The Sand

Rick also transformed our ammeter to a voltmeter, which makes much more sense with today's cars. The back of the gauge has a single wire hookup that connects to switched 12V. The front of the gauge still says "battery," and looks totally stock except for the different numbers.

Here's our "new" gauge cluster installed in the dash. This is the time to test all the new lights in the cluster. It's 10 times easier to tend to a high-beam indicator light now than after everything is installed in the car. Have the wiring diagram in front of you as you run through the circuit tests.

This project is as much about comfort and amenities as it is aesthetics, so we installed Mid America Motorworks' sound and heat barrier under the carpeting. With headers and a chambered exhaust running under the floorboard, this will certainly add a level of comfort to the driving experience of this classic.

Installing Mid America's carpet is a cinch and transforms a dismal interior into something beautiful. It's amazing how much sun-fade, water stains, and general dirt accumulate over the years, which you may not realize until you compare the new carpeting with your tired, old carpeting.

Since our computer and ignition-control module now reside in the space that the battery used to, the jack and storage compartment has become a jack and battery compartment. We fabricated brackets to raise the fiberboard cover to fit over the battery, and installed a set of '68 spring-ring battery cables to make the connections.

With the dashboard out of the way, it's definitely easier to work the carpeting into the forward area of the toe pan and to install the kick panel speakers, which we'll cover in a bit. If you were thinking of installing an aftermarket air-conditioning system, boy oh boy, now's the time to do it with everything out of the way.

Remember our "vision"? It called for tilt steering in this classic Corvette, something it never came with. It must look like it was factory installed or we don't want it. It must work like a factory unit or we don't want it. We put the call in to Flaming River.

Begin by removing the stock steering column. If you're going to remove the gauge cluster for restoration, pull the column. If you're only installing a new wiring harness, pull the column. Certainly if you're going to the extent we are here, pull the column, and get it out of the way. It's only a few bolts and a few minutes, and it will save you a lot of grief and net a much better job.

We're replacing the column with a Flaming River tilt steering column for midyear Corvettes. We want it to look like it was original equipment with this car, so we need this bracket, which is "button-welded" to the original column.

We begin by center-punching the button welds to locate the best center for our drill bit to cut away the weld. We could use a spot-weld cutter, but we don't want the center locating bit to pierce through the original column mast jacket. We could sublet the cutting job to a machine-shop end mill, but in the interest of keeping this job "common tool friendly," we're using a 3/8-inch drill bit to do the job.

We want to remove the weld only and not drill all the way through. The tip of the drill bit will pass all the way though the thickness of our bracket and just into the mast jacket below, but the remaining face of the drill won't go that far. This removes the majority of the weld, but not all of it. The remainder will be left up to a cold chisel and some hands-on finesse.

This is the bracket once it's removed from the original column (without the aluminum mounting pads). It will be attached to a brand-new stainless steel steering column, so you'll probably want to media blast it, paint it, and make it presentable. After all, if you don't do it now, you never will.