Original firewall pad removal

[Jonny B]

A friend of mine is rebuilding the engine in a 280SL that still has the original firewall pad. Somewhere along the way the engine bay was painted black, we are wanting to return this to the proper body color, but also want to remove and re-install the original pad. Any tips on how best to go about removing it completely so that it can be re-set??

[zoegrlh]

I removed my orig. about five years ago.  Did not come off in one piece, in fact it came off in hundreds of pieces.  I don't think it can be done successfully.
Bob

[Douglas]

It can be done, but the pad has to be in decent shape. Shoot an e-mail to Brian Peters over at motoringinvestments.com and ask his advice. He did that for the white-gray 280SL he restored.

[Jonny B]

Doug,

Thanks, I will send a note off to him.

[Anfinn]

I got mine off in 2 pieces. I discovered, however, that there has been some sort of foam backing on the pad, and the foam was 90% disintegrated. I haven't decided if I'm going to try to re-use the old one.
Is the foam something others have seen, or is mine not original?

[hkollan]

That layer of foam is original and will usually disintegrate when you remove the original pad. Personally I would try to save and reuse the original if possible.

[Mark280SL]

My car did not have the firewall pad when I bought it, the previous owner had painted the car but did not replace the pad so I have a clean painted firewall surface. I recently purchased a new pad from Millers and will install it when I get a chance but it has no foam material backing on it and it is fairly thin with a tan fiber like backing. It seemed quite thin and I was surprised when I first saw it so now that I'm seeing the mention of foam here I'm wondering if I need to purchase some type of foam pad also? is that still available ?

[hkollan]

The original firewall pad and material, also used on the interior side of the firewall hasn't been available from any source for a very long time. A few years ago someone had a few original pads for sale, asking price was around $3000 per set if I remember it correctly. All the repros that I've seen come without the foam on the back.