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Introduction

Sometimes you need to remove a seat, pieces of trim or even a carpet from vehicle's cabin in order to do some servicing, modification or upgrade work.

Since it's not every day that such items are removed from the cabin, it is an excellent opportunity to do some additional works while certain hidden sections of the cabin are now temporarily easily accessible.

There is no worst thing than assembling everything back together and just then getting an idea for some useful additional work which could have been done!! (actually there are: forgetting your wedding anniversary or your wife's birthday ..)

The purpose of this article is to list the ideas for such recommended additional works for each section of the cabin.

Side doors

• Installation of sound insulation and vibration damping materials in the door and/or on the inside of the door trim;
• Installation of better front speakers;
  • Valid only for Jimny 4;
• Rust protection of the door cavities through the application of wax for example;
• Re-greasing of side door window operating mechanisms, as well as side door opening and locking mechanisms;

Rear section of the cabin

• Installation of sound insulation and vibration damping materials on exposed metal panels and/or on the inside of removed trim pieces;
• Installation of a pair of rear speakers;
• Rust protection of the body cavities through the application of wax for example;
• Rear cabin lamp installation and wiring;
• Installation of wiring for:
  • Rear parking sensors;
  • Tow bar;
  • Rear reversing camera;
  • Rear facing dash camera (for continuous traffic recording);
  • Concealed GPS tracking unit;
  • 12 V DC connector in the boot;

Rear door

• Installation of sound insulation and vibration damping materials in the door and/or on the inside of the door trim;
• Installation of a rear facing dash camera on the top of the rear door window (for continuous traffic recording);
• Preventive maintenance of the rear window washing system;
• If your rear door does not have a key lock in its external handle:
  • Installation of a handle which contains a key lock (which had been re-keyed to your vehicle's keys);
• Re-greasing of door opening and locking mechanisms;
• Rust protection of the door cavities through the application of wax for example;
• Utilitarian modification of the OEM rear door trim or its replacement with aftermarket or DIY made utilitarian rear door trim.
  • Example functionalities: speaker enclosure, tools holder / hanger, collapsible shelve(s), storage compartment, etc.;

Floor

• Cleaning of any found rust and welding of rust holes if necessary.
  • Read the wiki article "Rust protection" for more details.
• Rust protection of the cavities in the sills below the side doors through the application of wax for example;
• Installation of additional sound insulation and vibration damping materials on the floor and/or on the underside of the carpet;

Roof

• Installation of sound insulation and vibration damping materials on the underside of the roof and/or on the inside of the roof liner;
• Installation of additional roof cabin lamps;
• Installation of wiring for:
  • Front and/or rear dash camera (for continuous traffic recording);
  • Externally roof mounted lamps;
  • 12 V DC connector on the roof for external applications;

Dash board

• You are a rather advanced disassembler if you got to the point of removing the entire dash board from the vehicle.
• Installation of additional sound insulation and vibration damping materials on the "firewall" (metal panel between the cabin and the engine bay);
• If the vehicle does not have factory fitted fog lamps and has no factory installed wiring for them in the cabin:
  • Installation of wiring for the front fog lamps, from the engine bay to the in-cabin switch in the dash board;
• Installation of additional wiring (with fuse(s)) between vehicle's battery and the cabin;
  • Useful for things like: an audio amplifier, additional cabin lamps, additional 12 V DC connectors in the cabin, custom made seat heaters, dash cameras, GPS trackers, etc.

Common notes

• Do not apply any rust proofing compound (wax, etc.) on the areas of the panels on which you intend to apply sound deadening materials!
• After applying sound deadening materials and letting them settle for couple of hours or so, you might apply small amounts of wax on any remaining exposed naked parts of the body panels.

Clip and wire rattle cushioning

• Whenever you disassemble any trim or molding panels or disconnect any wiring harnesses from the body which were held on by clips, it is also recommended to apply heavy duty reinforced fabric / textile / cloth tape over the mounting hole for each clip (while the clip is removed).
  • Then puncture the cloth tape with a screwdriver to reopen the hole.
• It is also recommended to wrap the cloth tape around wires and wiring looms.
• The cloth tape will serve as a cushioning layer which will eliminate any possible rattles and vibrations caused by imperfect clip connections or by wires touching the surrounding surfaces.
  • An example of a quality cloth tape product is Tesa 57230.

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Page last edited on 15/07/2019 by user Bosanek