The International Cessna^® 170 Association

I had an entire bolt of it rolled up and stored until one day it was discovered the moths had eaten holes all thru it.

The back seat.

Copilot's door panel

Side kick plate in front of the starboard door.

A closeup showing the texture of the cloth. The trim is vinyl.

gahorn wrote:I had an entire bolt of it rolled up and stored until one day it was discovered the moths had eaten holes all thru it.

Damn!

When I restored my previous 1948 C170 to 'factory original' award winning condition, I engaged a well known classic and rare auto restoration shop near me. The upholsterer there took samples of the old original fabrics in the plane and sent them to a service that identifies the sample and provides locator service to match it. The wool headliner and carpet material of the '48 C170 is still used today in luxury European autos. The seating and trim was also a wool blend, but no longer available, so the service provides samples of available fabric with close color, pattern and feel. Then I gave all the parts to them and the master upholsterer copied the sewed patterns and vinyl exactly.

This company is known around the world for restorations of autos that have values of many millions of $$. Last week they were putting finishing touches on a Rolls Royce Phantom for a client...this is a one of a kind auto that was all hand built as a prototype. http://www.lcars.com/pages/projects.php

Good luck.
John

There used to be a non-descript company in south Dallas with a huge, multi-story warehouse of automotive fabrics from bygone eras. An aircraft refinisher I knew, Vernon Edwards, took me there in 1983 and we purchased several yards of fabric from the 1938 Cadillac which my employer at the time favored for upholstering the King Air. I was amazed at the huge inventory available in that line of products.
If I can find the details of who that was I'll post a follow up.

gahorn wrote:There used to be a non-descript company in south Dallas with a huge, multi-story warehouse of automotive fabrics from bygone eras. An aircraft refinisher I knew, Vernon Edwards, took me there in 1983 and we purchased several yards of fabric from the 1938 Cadillac which my employer at the time favored for upholstering the King Air. I was amazed at the huge inventory available in that line of products.
If I can find the details of who that was I'll post a follow up.

That would be awesome. I'm still looking.

There's a place in Oregon, contact Dillon Barron. They helped me with some information I need for 2935D. Same interior you have. Check in the directory for E-Mail information For Dillon. Hope this helps Rusty

Bill,

I'm assuming that the pictures hide something...those seats look brand new to me! It is too cool to see survivors from the 1950s. You own a true gem.

True Ryan, the photos don't show the worn parts very well. In the first shot of the "pilot's seat" (actually I think this is the co-pilot's seat based on a second look at the original sales brochures) they can and have been swapped left for right a number of times due to wear issues) you can see the far edge is worn through along the top side seam. Less obvious is wear on the near edge which has not gone completely through. There are also two rust colored patches at each bottom corner of the seat back where the hinge supports are. They are not real obvious but are not original. The other front seat has more wear. The floor carpet is the worst. It is totally shot. The headliner looks brand new except for one 1/4 cut over the back seats. The back seat is also in pretty good shape along with the door and other side panels.

I've looked at carpet from three different companies.

Airtex has some nylon stuff that's about the right color but has much longer nap than the original which is fairly thin. It looks like it would wear quickly to me. It also looks like they cut the basic shape correctly but the part number fits an number of different models and the person I know that installed one had to do a lot of trimming. They also put heel pads on the floor just aft of the rudder pedals. My plane has aluminum sheet metal plates over the carpet there so I don't want the rubber ones.

SCS Interiors in Duluth, MN, offers kits as well. Their nylon carpet looks better than the Airtex stuff and their wool carpet looks very good although, again, it is pretty thick. I'm not sure how the wool carpet would wrap around the center control tunnel. Their patterns seem to be specific to the 170 and look to be very accurate. Also, like Airtex's, these carpets come with heel plates that I don't want.

Douglass Interior Products in Bellvue, Wa., makes some very nice nylon carpet that is not cut pile, it thin, looks sturdy, is a good color, and meets the FAR 25 fire test requirements. Unfortunately it does not come pre-cut. They apear to do interior work mostly for big jet$.

The other problem I have is... My current carpet is held down around the edge with very small screws and tapered washers as well as the aforementioned aluminum heel plates. That's fine but all of the inspection plated and the cover over a camera port that was added in 1964 under the copilot's seat have their own individual pieces of carpet glued to them with an appropriate hole in the main carpet where they fit. this makes annual inspection much easier and I'd like to stick with that system.

Does anyone have any experience cutting nylon carpet, perhaps with a hot wire tool to get clean edges that don't ravel. I may just get some carpet and do some testing.

I still have not found anything close to the rust color or texture for seat fabrics. I see I've got some leads to follow up on since I last looked at this thread. Thanks Rusty and John. Did you ever find that fabric warehouse in Dallas gahorn?

Just a suggestion-----you might look at vrs sources for the carpet material and/or find a local craftsman who knows how to do vehicle carpet, et al. Back when I was ready to have my interior done for the second time (2001) I looked closely at Airtex since I have one of their headliners (wool) and have been very satisfied with it. However, although I have seen some Airtex interiors that looked pretty good, a local craftsman who can fit everything to your plane may result in a custom look that you will like. He or you can locate the material that is fire retardant or can treat it to meet FAA requirements. My guy did everything, bound all edges, etc and used velkro to attach all carpet to the floor. This has worked for me. It may be a bit costly, but having checked Airtex's prices, which have escalated a bunch since 2001, you may be able to get a custom job for about the same cost. I too had the metal heel plates and initially put them in. Later I found an automotive upholstry shop who sewed rubber heel pads onto my carpet. Looks much better (IMHO) and works well. Of course if you do a lot of camping, etc. the metal ones may offer more protection.

interstellardust wrote:...
Does anyone have any experience cutting nylon carpet, perhaps with a hot wire tool to get clean edges that don't ravel. I may just get some carpet and do some testing.

I still have not found anything close to the rust color or texture for seat fabrics. I see I've got some leads to follow up on since I last looked at this thread. Thanks Rusty and John. Did you ever find that fabric warehouse in Dallas gahorn?

"Serge" the edges of the carpet if you wish to have a clean finish/edge on it. (This is a sewing-machine edging resembling button-holing on a shirt.)

The fabric warehouse has apparently gone out of business. ... but this may be their successors...): http://www.keystonbros.com/our-company/ ... dallas-tx/

We have a former EAA member that does aircraft interiors located at KZER, Minersville PA. Ron Kozura does antique interiors also.

John