Author Topic: The Pagoda SL113 Group Firewall Pad Recreation Project  (Read 124751 times)

69280sl

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Re: The Pagoda SL113 Group Firewall Pad Recreation Project
« Reply #50 on: October 03, 2011, 14:22:33 »
Hello Alfred

I see these are being made available to the German group (?). Are we getting anything from them? I would love one of their grill badges.

Gus
Gus

68 280sl, signal red/ beige/black softtop. Car # 1084

Drewtee

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Re: The Pagoda SL113 Group Firewall Pad Recreation Project
« Reply #51 on: October 03, 2011, 16:21:27 »

Quote Garry:

Hi All,

Am still looking for a RHD firewall pad pattern taken from either an original one someone is removing or from a reproduction one that someone still has but not yet fitted??

Garry


Are you still looking for this Garry as Kevin O'keefe in the UK I( Ace Trimmer) has a template and can also get them cut (at a reasonable cost)
Andy Tee

Rhd 5 speed 728h with parchment interior
White Californian 280sl LHD
W111 3.5 Cab and Coupe both RHD

labella

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Re: The Pagoda SL113 Group Firewall Pad Recreation Project
« Reply #52 on: October 03, 2011, 16:30:26 »
Hi Alfred ,I am ready when you are ,thanks for your hard work and thinking of me,

PS there is a new and improved product on te market .The first product was bad the 2nd was better the most recent is the best to date.I am hoping yours will be correct and the best of all !

Best regards.
Tony LaBella

labella

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Re: The Pagoda SL113 Group Firewall Pad Recreation Project
« Reply #53 on: October 03, 2011, 16:46:13 »
Hi Alfred,
If this is a 1 or 2 time event,I will take 3 for the 1st group,if the quality is good more the 2nd group and will continue if mre are produced,all LHD.

Thanks,
Tony LaBella

66andBlue

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Re: The Pagoda SL113 Group Firewall Pad Recreation Project
« Reply #54 on: October 03, 2011, 17:03:14 »
....  I see these are being made available to the German group (?). Are we getting anything from them? I would love one of their grill badges. ...
Gus,
we do not get anything from any one, and in addition the Pagodentreff.de group never had a badge , as far as I know.
Alfred
1964 230SL manual 4-speed 568H signal red
1966 230SL automatic 334G light blue (sold)
1968 280SL automatic (now 904G midnight blue)

MB-TEXada

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Re: The Pagoda SL113 Group Firewall Pad Recreation Project
« Reply #55 on: October 03, 2011, 21:31:23 »
We would like to purchase one set for our '66 230SL LHD.
Thank you for the effort.
I would like to note that because of this we immediately signed up as full members.

Dave Opko

Peter van Es

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Re: The Pagoda SL113 Group Firewall Pad Recreation Project
« Reply #56 on: October 04, 2011, 07:55:18 »
Alfred,

please put me down for one LHD.

Peter
1970 280SL. System Admin of the site. Please do not mail or PM me questions on Pagoda's... I'm not likely to know the answer.  Please post on the forum instead!

W113SL

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Re: MBCA judging rules
« Reply #57 on: October 04, 2011, 21:26:42 »
All: Speaking for the MBCA National Concours Committee, the repacement pads that were made up from the material that MBUSA formerly sold is the only pad, other than carefully preserved ones that are acceptable for concours judging at this time.

The verdict will be out on the new pads when we actually see them.

If the old pads material sold by the roll, is no longer available and MBUSA no longer offers any replacements, then  the MBCA Concours Committee will probably accept the new version as produced by the SL113 group the de-facto standard replacement.

I hope that answers the question of it's authenticity.

Pete Lesler
MBCA National Concours Committee Chair

jszeman1

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Re: The Pagoda SL113 Group Firewall Pad Recreation Project
« Reply #58 on: October 05, 2011, 01:07:30 »
Alfred,
My car is number 671 so it does have the diamond pad as you are making.  The only difference on my car is that there is no access cut out for the heater core valve.   I do believe mine originally was a 2 part pad also.  Can you make a two part pad with the diamond pattern without the cutout for the heater core?
JohnS

66andBlue

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Re: The Pagoda SL113 Group Firewall Pad Recreation Project
« Reply #59 on: October 05, 2011, 03:09:45 »
John,
both the small and the large part of the pad contribute to the opening for the valve access hole. In order to eliminate that we will have to buy two new dies since the contours are different.
Only thing that we could do is to give you some extra material and you cut out a "plug" to fill the opening.
Alfred
1964 230SL manual 4-speed 568H signal red
1966 230SL automatic 334G light blue (sold)
1968 280SL automatic (now 904G midnight blue)

jameshoward

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Re: The Pagoda SL113 Group Firewall Pad Recreation Project
« Reply #60 on: October 05, 2011, 09:24:54 »
Hi, Alfred,

Could you please put me down for 1 x LHD and associated material to do the area in the footwells (happy to take advice on how much, etc). Depending on price, I may take 2, but definitely one!

Many thanks,

JH
James Howard
1966 LHD 230SL

Naj ✝︎

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Re: The Pagoda SL113 Group Firewall Pad Recreation Project
« Reply #61 on: October 05, 2011, 09:56:35 »
Hi, Alfred,

One each firewall pads LHD/RHD + any interior pieces that become available.

Thanks
Naj
68 280SL

jacovdw

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Re: The Pagoda SL113 Group Firewall Pad Recreation Project
« Reply #62 on: October 05, 2011, 14:05:33 »
The early 230SL did not have the access plug for the heater core valve...

Not to thrown a spanner in the works here, but the firewall was changed from chassis number 042 004350 (about June 1964) for the 230SL's to have the rubber access plug for the heater valve.

I suppose the demand for cars with chassis numbers earlier as quoted above would be far fever than the later cars with the access plug and a good compromise, as Alfred suggested, would be to cut your own to fill the gap...


jszeman1

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Re: The Pagoda SL113 Group Firewall Pad Recreation Project
« Reply #63 on: October 06, 2011, 02:20:13 »
Can you put me down for a LHD with extra materal for the plug and trunk.  Thanks John
JohnS

smiledoc

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Re: The Pagoda SL113 Group Firewall Pad Recreation Project
« Reply #64 on: October 06, 2011, 03:51:06 »
The original ones are now available!    I installed mine in about 2 hours today....taking my time, removing my "new" pad and glue....making a few needed cuts, etc.    I love it...feel like my "perfect" car is more complete and authentic now.

Tom Colitt

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Re: The Pagoda SL113 Group Firewall Pad Recreation Project
« Reply #65 on: October 06, 2011, 05:15:35 »
The original ones are now available!    I installed mine in about 2 hours today....taking my time, removing my "new" pad and glue....making a few needed cuts, etc.    I love it...feel like my "perfect" car is more complete and authentic now.

Hi Smiledoc (I'm sorry. At first, I was led to believe you WERE Babak, the Benz restorer, but the post below still applies, to help sort out some, but not all, confusion :-)

We have all received the email that the Benz Restorer is offering a reproduction pad as well. I met him in person at a local Mercedes meet this past Sunday, but even though I talked to him about how much I appreciated his enthusiasm and entrepreneurship for independently starting his own version of a firewall pad, we also talked about the quality of his reproduction. I told him that I really hoped he would still be able to sell his pad on ebay and to other customers of his, but I believed that few on this web-site would likely purchase his pad unless it were priced considerably cheaper than the one Alfred is having made. For you to make the claim "The original ones are now available" is somewhat surprising. I don't like raining on Babak's hard work and I never commented directly on his posts or to his email, but beside that pad not being fabricated out of the original raw material, the "pattern" was merely made with a die that pushes rows of square-shaped indentations into the tar-like or rubberized surface of the material. There is no real 3-d structure to the pattern at all, so that the end result does not look very much like the original. If we couldn't buy the exact, correct fire-retardant material that Alfred has found, matched to the almost identical pattern and surface texture, I must say, I would still not be very interested in buying this pad and, I believe neither would 90% of the very informed members in this community, after knowing the full story. I think I have a reputation for being one of the most critical anywhere, when it comes to authenticity on Pagodas and I hope, the club would be more than happy to work with Babak on reproducing the late model ATE brake reservoir, etc., but now that you, Smiledoc, have made this post on this thread, I thought I should comment. I think Babak's shift knobs, mirrors and other items he sells are quite good, but on this one, he jumped the gun. By the way, all of us are making virtually zero at the club's introductory pricing (even though it has been a very time consuming project for me and Alfred was not always easy to convince unless I provided him with iron-clad proof of very original Pagodas that have come through my workshop :-)). I don't think we even get one free pad (wink).....

I see this effort and possible future reproductions as the beginning of doing some really nice work, similar to the Gull Wing group and I think that maybe one day even Mercedes Benz will be convinced by the quality of our work and start working together with us, considering that the classic center in Irvine has some true enthusiasts as well who secretly do appreciate when (correct) form follows (MB) function ;-)

This also goes to Pete Lesler's comment about authenticity: While you may be technically correct that Mercedes-Benz (and the club accredited by them) might not consider the club's firewall pad "authentic", I am glad to vouch for it as being the best that we can possibly hope for, at a cost that is somewhat acceptable. The margin of error is really VERY small. I think I have already commented on the choice of the high quality synthetic felt for the backing. I would have preferred something like the original (for most cars) foam, but I think the membership had given its vote and I still think that Alfred would eventually be willing to let us offer a foam backing as well. I have gotten 5 out of five "Best in Class" trophies using a very similar, earlier version of this pad against some other very stiff Mercedes competition that normally would beat even the best Pagodas hands down. Dare I say, that some of the judges were other recognized experts, such as Scott Melnik and Tom Hanson and also this forums active member Bob Geco at events like the LA Concours at the Rose Bowl, The Muckenthaler, the Palos Verdes Concours on the Trump Golf Course (that is not supposed to be an endorsement of quality ;-) -you're fired!) and the amazing Dana Point (formerly Newport Beach) Concours.

As far as the Benz Dr.s comment about the installation, I like the idea with the wax paper because as we know, getting this two-dimensional pad onto a very 3-dimensional surface is not the easiest task. Also, one forgets that several items such as the temperature sending unit and a few cables and tubes have to be disconnected, so people with two left thumbs may want to leave this job to others. If you have no problem doing these tasks, then joining the outer, patterned layer with the inner backing should be no problem, even without a special tool.

And as far as the earlier Pagodas without the heater access hole, I honestly would see if Alfred is willing to sell you just the material and then do a one-off cut-out myself. A lot more work, but a lot better result and authenticity. The other approach would be like having the vin plate cutout pre-stamped on all pads which would simply be "wrong" for most US bound Pagodas that had the VIN plate attached to the b-pillar. For the very first Pagodas that used yet another of about 5 different materials used by MB at one point or another, you may actually be better off searching for another material.The few hundred looked like they used roofing paper.....

Regards, Tom Colitt
« Last Edit: October 06, 2011, 07:10:41 by Tom Colitt »

Kopie

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Re: The Pagoda SL113 Group Firewall Pad Recreation Project
« Reply #66 on: October 06, 2011, 12:18:50 »
I would like one for my 1971 280sl.  Thank you for all of the hard leg work to get this done.
Jim K

thelews

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Re: The Pagoda SL113 Group Firewall Pad Recreation Project
« Reply #67 on: October 06, 2011, 12:48:12 »
2 or 3 LHD for me please.
Enjoy some pictures at this link:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/8292359@N06/sets/72157603240571101/show/

John - Wisconsin
1967 Early 250 SL Red/Caviar, Manual #1543
1961 190 SL 23K miles
1964 Porsche 356
1970 Porsche 911E
1991 BMW 318is
1966 Jaguar XKE
1971 Alfa Romeo GTV 1750

smiledoc

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Re: The Pagoda SL113 Group Firewall Pad Recreation Project
« Reply #68 on: October 06, 2011, 13:28:16 »
I still want a more perfect pad from the group.   But, for the weekend car show, I'm very glad to have this version!

quattrouser

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Re: The Pagoda SL113 Group Firewall Pad Recreation Project
« Reply #69 on: October 06, 2011, 17:13:26 »
I'll take 2 sets of LHD when they are available!

Peter

Mark280SL

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Re: The Pagoda SL113 Group Firewall Pad Recreation Project
« Reply #70 on: October 07, 2011, 03:25:18 »
I'd like to get on the list for a set for my 1970 280sl
Mark

hands_aus

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Re: The Pagoda SL113 Group Firewall Pad Recreation Project
« Reply #71 on: October 07, 2011, 09:59:57 »
Hello,

I want one RHD SET for my early 250 SL (VIN plate on the top of the Firewall)

Thanks
Bob Smith (Brisbane,Australia)
RHD,1967 early 250 SL #114, auto, ps , 717,717
best of the best

mbforfun

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Re: The Pagoda SL113 Group Firewall Pad Recreation Project
« Reply #72 on: October 11, 2011, 04:13:46 »
I just found this link on recreation of firewall pad and wish to be added to list of interested members. Great job.

George Des

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Re: The Pagoda SL113 Group Firewall Pad Recreation Project
« Reply #73 on: October 11, 2011, 11:44:03 »
Any idea when these will become ready for purchase?

George

lollo71

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Re: The Pagoda SL113 Group Firewall Pad Recreation Project
« Reply #74 on: October 11, 2011, 15:58:54 »
Alfred,

I would love to get 3 firewall pad for LHD cars, if possible.

Thanks,
Claudia