[ilangop]

Hi all.
With my 1989 Premier Padmini due for fitness test, my Da took it for a quick, budget paint job and got the passing renewed.
However I insisted that the cosmetic bits shall be done under my supervision. As I stay 350km far from my PP I thought I would have little control over the situation. Hence I decided that all the Rexin work shall be prepared by my regular Rexin operator (Shankar Anna) at Pune and be shipped to Chennai. And go through the DIY route for installing the same. And with my dad's support things fell in place and I could accomplish in a 4 days vacation to my parent's place.

Upon opening up the original rexin over the seat I was clueless if I would really able to accomplish it. But somehow picked up the guts and started off. Call Shankar anna and followed the process as he explained. First started with the speaker tray, then the C pillar and rear wheel arch trims. The rear seat and the back rest required a layer of 1" and 0.5" sponge respectively to compensate for the flattening of original sponge due to age. With the help of my cousin who is also a DIY enthusiast a layer of heatlon for the firewall and the floor mat was installed. Meanwhile dad bought a set of new door rubber beading set of Ambassador (didn't get the padmini door beading set). At the end of the day, floor carpet, door beadings and front cosmetics were complete. Shankar anna was kind enough to include all clips, pins, hooks and even the unique pliers used to crimp the hooks. I particularly insisted that I didn't want even a single screw on the door panels. He was kind enough to even include the rare @ shaped hooks used on the top side of the door panels.

After doing the rear seats, installed the A, B pillar & front foot well trims. Meanwhile removed the front seat and took it home. Though as per the initial plan I was ok to do away with the newpaper holder net behind the front seat rest, after a second thought I decided to retain it. Now the seat rest cover didn't have the provision for preserving the net. Again spent half a day to purchase rexin of the same brand and color, get them stitched as per our needs and viola the net is back again.

By the end of 3rd day of my vacation I was almost done with all installations except the front bench seat. One of the springs was cut and the Jute base was also worn out. Due to lack of time I decided to do it while I will be there for the Diwali vacation.