Jensen-Healey Interior

Healey Journal

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The interior was in pretty fair shape and looked presentable, but the seats were a pair of after-market ones more suitable for a hot hatchback than for a classic British sports car.

Besides their incongruity they were just too big and rubbed against the doors. I thus decided as a matter of some priority to obtain a new set of seats, preferably Jensen-Healey ones. I found a pair from a Mark II that were in good condition, and will install them when appropriate.

Once I started looking closely at the car I noted that it's interior trim was dated at best: none of the boot was trimmed at all so it would need the complete set for that. The carpeting in the front too wasn't original and seemed just stuck down with some kind of hard-dried goo.

The door panels looked OK but their color was a kind of odd black/gray stripe. It didn't look bad, but it wasn't that nice either. And the armrests for the doors were old and years of elbows had caused one to crack.

So, what with one thing and another I got a full set of interior panels and carpeting for the main compartment and the boot too.

The dash and instruments were all in decent condition and worked well. A good cleaning and some minor attention (like replacing one wrong signal indicator) would be all they needed.

The "crash-roll" at the top of the windshield needed major attention, one side had a large-ish piece broken off and it all felt very fragile. I've not been able to find any replacement or reproduction ones and all the used ones seem to be in comparable condition. I suspect that I'll have to use the good parts of mine to create a mould, then use some type of expanding foam to make the basic shape and cover it with a fiberglass skin. Seems a lot of work....

I obtained a set of used but good condition sun flaps so they're available, though I really don't know if I'd install them.

I've obtained a new set of seat-belts to replace the old and well worn ones in the car. They're the original Jensen-Healey ones and I may at some point see about whether they could be reconditioned, but since the car as I'm rebuilding it isn't going to be a concours star this seems an item destined to just sit in a box in the garage.

The top was badly fitted and allowed more water than normal in. A later Jensen-Healey hardtop was found and re-conditioned. It was first thoroughly cleaned. The weather stripping was removed as were the old, rusted latches. The inside was then painted flat white and the exposed metal at the front with the rear and side fixing points cleaned of rust, primed with an anti-rust primer and then painted gloss black. New weather stripping was applied to the front where it met the windshield, across the rear where it sat on the body and around the windows. These were sourced from Woolies by matching the old with the cross-sections found in their catalog. The "new" top would then provide much greater protection against bad weather.

I also plan on reconditioning the convertible top frame and installing a new top, but that'll wait until the car's more fully functioning. The frame's been cleaned and painted with anti-rust primer and awaiting some nice sunny weather to motivate me to finish it, get a top and install it.

A final interior job has been to install a contemporary roll bar. This is one acquired from e-bay. It's not a proper racing bar but seems adequate for my purposes, I've no intention of rolling the car over to see whether it works... but it looks right, unlike some of the "hoop" style bars I've seen installed- they're just too modern and look like someone's swiped them from a BMW or something....