2QuickNovas - Bruce's Interior Modifications

Bruce's '72 Interior Mods

Fiero Bucket Seat Installation:

When I bought my Nova it had some ratty old bucket seats from some Chrysler product installed. They were ripped and ugly so I put those cheesy fuzzy seat covers on them (got them for real cheap from a friend) to try to get through until I could afford something better. Brutal, aren't they?

Fortunately my wife gave me the money to buy replacement bucket seats as a gift one year and I eventually found these seats for $125 that came out of a Fiero, but I'm not sure what year.

They were virtually perfect except for one small hole in the driver's seat. They're extremely comfortable and have good lateral support, too. There are four mounting points under each seat and the four points are all in the same plane, which makes it relatively easy to mount them. Unfortunately the floor of a Nova isn't flat, so I had to create mounting brackets of different heights at each corner. Also, the Fiero seats are quite short (from the top of cushion to their mounting points), so I wanted to raise them up off the floor to make it more comfortable.

Here's a shot of one of the brackets I made. I just used some sheet steel and bent it into a U-shape with flats at the bottom so I'd have something to weld to, and a flat spot on top which I drilled out to bolt the seats to.

Center Console:

Here's the center console I built in '96. I made it mostly of 3/4" plywood screwed together and it's covered in gray tweed and vinyl material which was attached with 3M Spray Trim Adhesive. Unfortunately I don't have any pictures from the construction phase, but it's held together mostly with right-angle brackets and wood screws. Pretty simple, really, but it definitely took some time to plan and build the thing.

The can cooler is sitting in a lower portion of the "tray" that I made specifically for that purpose.

At the rear of the console is an enclosed storage area that doubles as an arm rest. The lid is padded with foam under the tweed and attached with a piano hinge.

It's a Hurst Quarter Stick shifter, I installed it in the spring of 2001. The other pictures show the mid-'70s Monte Carlo shifter I had for the previous twelve years.

Gauge Panel:

I wanted a place for some 2-5/8" gauges so I made a gauge panel to go between the console tray and the dashboard. I used 1/2" particle board and covered it in the same vinyl material that covers the console tray.

Since I installed the stereo in the gauge panel, the factory stereo location was empty. I didn't want to cut it up so I just shaped up some textured black ABS plastic and RTV'd it to the dash. That way I can remove it in the future if I wish, and in the meantime I can mount switches in it without cutting up the factory dash.

Tilt Steering Column:

I also installed a '73 Nova SS tilt-steering column in 1999; it's nice to have! You can kind of see it in this picture, it's just your basic '70s tilt column.

Next Project: New In-Dash Gauge Cluster

I've got Autometer Ultralite gauges for speed, rpm, volts, coolant temp, oil pressure, and fuel on hand, and I would like add them to a custom instrument panel insert that replaces the factory fuel/speedo/clock cluster. I've been wanting to do this for over 20 years and there are some companies out there that have produced something similar in recent years, but they're pretty expensive and my specific gauges won't fit, so I'll pursue my own version.

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