1971 Jaguar XJ Series 1 AJ6 - And now for our headliner...

Thanks for all your reactions! For the hubcaps I was indeed going for a look as found on earlier Jags, but also 60's Mercedeses and Rollers. For those of you wondering why I went for a red accent on the caps: this will now be explained.

Now the exterior is pretty much there I decided to tackle the interior. The original one was a very worn version of the very common beige leather, which looked and smelled like your grandma’s hearing aid. It was a nice contrast with the black but nearly every bit was worn through, sun damaged, or dirty beyond cleaning. This was pretty much fine until the exterior looked as good as it did. Here's a picture of how it was:




As luck has it, I’d found a better interior from a poverty-spec car, which meant tidy Ambla vinyl instead of the inevitably cracked and torn leather nearly all other XJs have. Moreover, it had one other trait which made it perfect for my car:




It was red. I’m a sucker for black over red and was determined to have my XJ look that way too. The center console here was a matter of redoing, reglueing and touching up. Redoing the rest of the interior sadly wasn’t as easy as taking the old one out and putting the new one in. Years of moisture ingress had turned the door cards into moldy oatmeal, as evidenced here.




So new water-resistant boards were made for all 4 doors and covered with the original vinyl. As the red interior door cards had holes for the keep-fit windows, which my fine automobile didn’t need, I used the beige originals and recolored them with 5 layers of Angelus Crimson Red vinyl paint.






Here can see the new boards being test fitted to ensure they don't rub:




The doors themselves were effectively silenced with some strips of 2mm butyl sound deadening on the marked places, and closed cell foam to prevent the cards vibrating. The interior of each door was rustproofed with Fluid Film and cavity wax. They now give a very satisfying thud when closing them.




All doors then received a new moisture barrier to keep the new cards fresh.




And on went the new door panels. I’d adapted these to use Series 2 front door pockets because they look better and have a handy grab handle to close the door that my Series 1 items strangely missed.




At the rear I chose Series 2 pockets as well for the integrated speakers, which I modified to also hold the S1 window switches.




The board for the parcel shelf was equally destroyed. These are always black originally, regardless of interior color. I preferred to keep the interior theme so a new one was cut out of the same board as the doorcards and covered with new red vinyl. After testing it in the sun I've found that the red doesn't cause any annoying reflections in the rear window.




The floors and roof (like the rest of the car) were rustproofed with Owatrol and painted over with Hammerite, and sound deadened in the same manner as the doors.




The seats went in as well as a new set of seat belts. The originals were frayed and black, so I opted for some luscious burgundy seat belts with chrome buckles from the USA, which look and feel great. Ditto for new the red Furflex around the door openings.






I’m very pleased with the result. Going from grubby beige to sumptuous red makes all the difference, don’t you think?