Author Topic: Carpet rubber bushing grommet trim for automatic shift (Read 7156 times)

doitwright · « **on:** January 26, 2018, 02:27:22 »

I’ve tried all the carpet suppliers on the west coast, the Classic Center, Bud’s, eBay and I have concluded no one makes the rubber carpet trim for the automatic shift that looks like the original molded piece. Carpet suppliers typically sew a vinyl edging trim with varoious (far short of original) results. Tony at Heritage Trim has talked about reproducing this piece but he is too busy to bother right now.

At the last PUB in Virginia, an attendee who does Pagoda restorations commented that he is having the grommet (not really sure what to call it) reproduced exclusively for the cars he does and he will not offer them for sale. Ok. Fine.

A Pagoda recently offered for sale by the Classic Center (the green one) has the grommet in the carpet. How did they do that? They won’t tell. I called. They said call GAHH.

If someone reading this post is plannning on replacing their original carpet, I would be interested to talk to you about using an original grommet to serve as a template to make a mold to reproduce these. If you have not tossed out your old carpet, at least save the grommet.

If you know a source for these, I would appreciate any info you can provide since I would prefer to pursue that route.

Grommets for the manual shift are available. I’m interested in the grommet for the automatic trans.

Thanks in advance for your consideration.

dirkbalter · « **Reply #1 on:** January 26, 2018, 17:25:13 »

Frank,
My original carpet is out and somewhere in a corner. I can dig it up but I am not sure I totally understand what you are looking for. Is it possible to post a picture, showing the grommet you are talking about?

Dirk

doitwright · « **Reply #2 on:** January 26, 2018, 17:32:15 »

Dirk,

You are right. A photo is always better than a bunch of words.

dirkbalter · « **Reply #3 on:** January 26, 2018, 17:38:26 »

Ahh, got it.
I will look for it this week-end and let you know.

Pawel66 · « **Reply #4 on:** January 26, 2018, 22:18:06 »

Frank,

Please check this out:

https://www.sl113.org/forums/index.php?topic=25511.msg182715#msg182715

I did what you are doing a coupe of years ago as I also wanted to have that rubber "neck" around my shifter in a car similar to yours (1970). You have lots of my posts on it on the forum. I came to the conclusion that most likely late cars might not have had this rubber "neck" around the shifter base, they might have had the vinyl tape or the upholstery material finish. This conclusion was based on some of the posts by fellow members, some pictures and also by a picture of original MB carpet bought by a member as a spare part. Quality of some of the finishing touches MB were applying was being value optimized over time... Also, as one elder gentleman who worked in MB those days told me: they fitted what they had at hand (almost).

So: I was obsesd, but I got over now. And I feel much better.

P.S. if you find two of those somewhere, let me know...

doitwright · « **Reply #5 on:** January 27, 2018, 01:27:22 »

Pawel,

I remember reading your posts on the subject. I purchased my car in 2006 and it had it's original worn out, stinky and faded carpet. The attached photo shows where I was at with the car on February 23, 2010. My car had the grommet. That was almost 8 years ago and my 60 year old brain knew back then that new carpets would not come with that piece so I should save it. Perhaps I did. But for the life of me, I cannot find it. Of course, it will probably be discovered in my garage right after I fork out $$$ for a replacement.

Brian Peters from Motoring Investments discusses this on his site in the "280SL Buyers Guide". His contention is that late model W113's came with the carpet grommet.

With the emergence of the reproduction firewall pad, it surprises me someone has not addressed the auto trans carpet grommet already. My guess is that someone out there is already working on it. After all there are grommets available for the manual trans shifter.

Pawel66 · « **Reply #6 on:** January 27, 2018, 10:09:40 »

Ok, I see - if I had my original carpet with a rubber one, I would also go after the rubber one!

Overall: I place the wisdom of this forum over the wisdom of a car dealer, even experienced one (there is a lot of incorrect deatails on Motoring Investment cars and I also witnessed many times that dealers say what best serves them at the moment - just my scepticism). I have also seen in many places here that certain way of doing things in our cars might not have been as consisten across the years as we may believe. So I think the rubber finish was not the only way of finishing the shifter gate carpet edge.

My car had square weave carpets (1970!). And I made it with square weaved carpets today. Unfortunately the piece on top of the shaft tunnel was not saved - I do not know what the finish was exactly... But if I found this ruber piece, I would seriously consider replacement.

doitwright · « **Reply #7 on:** January 27, 2018, 15:26:23 »

Quote from: Pawel66 on January 27, 2018, 10:09:40

Ok, I see - if I had my original carpet with a rubber one, I would also go after the rubber one!

Overall: I place the wisdom of this forum over the wisdom of a car dealer, even experienced one (there is a lot of incorrect deatails on Motoring Investment cars and I also witnessed many times that dealers say what best serves them at the moment - just my scepticism). I have also seen in many places here that certain way of doing things in our cars might not have been as consisten across the years as we may believe. So I think the rubber finish was not the only way of finishing the shifter gate carpet edge.

My car had square weave carpets (1970!). And I made it with square weaved carpets today. Unfortunately the piece on top of the shaft tunnel was not saved - I do not know what the finish was exactly... But if I found this ruber piece, I would seriously consider replacement.

Pawel,

I agree with everything you say. When my car was repainted, I tried to find a conclusive answer for the correct finish on the underside of the car. After looking at dozens of cars on the MI site there were inconsistent examples of what was supposed to be correct including the Holy Grail cars and restored cars. In addition, a shift change at the factory, a customers special order request, or just using up what was still in stock from a previous year could account for the differences. Since nine of us actually worked on the cars as they were originally built, there will be certain things left unexplained.

Iconic · « **Reply #8 on:** January 27, 2018, 16:33:42 »

Quote from: Pawel66 on January 26, 2018, 22:18:06

I came to the conclusion that most likely late cars might not have had this rubber "neck" around the shifter base, they might have had the vinyl tape or the upholstery material finish. This conclusion was based on some of the posts by fellow members, some pictures and also by a picture of original MB carpet bought by a member as a spare part. Quality of some of the finishing touches MB were applying was being value optimized over time... Also, as one elder gentleman who worked in MB those days told me: they fitted what they had at hand (almost).

Pawel, I am skeptical of your conclusion.
Do you still believe this?
Sales brouchures often had non-production items shown in photos due to lack of availability of some production intent parts when the photos needed to be taken. There are many examples of this, so this can be discounted.
What members claim they have original non-rubber automatic shift gate trim?
Badli? Badali, can you take a closer picture and post it. In that other string that is referenced here, Badali's looks like rubber to me. I've seen Badali's car in person. I wish I looked at it then.
What other members claim this?
Carpet pieces bought at a later date from MB, after production, can be discounted since post production "original" parts often are not identical to what was used in original production from '63 to '71.
What say you???

Pawel66 · « **Reply #9 on:** January 27, 2018, 20:28:25 »

That is my story and I am sticking to it!

Of course I cannot be 100% sure.

You can chose what to discount or not as you like. I could discount the rubber testimonies and say it has never been rubber.

There is a little bit more than you say about the non-rubber finish there in those posts. I think Badali knows what he is talking about. I believe that rubber was there, but not always. I do not know the pattern. I would not be surprised if MB dropped it having produced some uphoilstery sets as it looked a bit inferior.

By the way: the rubber was not, I htink, the rubber band. On the photographs I have seen ot looks like rubber formed in some mould, actually.

dirkbalter · « **Reply #10 on:** January 27, 2018, 23:59:40 »

Well, as mentioned earlier, here are some pics of what I believe is my original carpet. In the car and now. (66-230)
Dirk

Pawel66 · « **Reply #11 on:** January 28, 2018, 00:24:51 »

Nice colours!

hkollan · « **Reply #12 on:** January 28, 2018, 15:17:37 »

Hi,

I fully subscribe to Iconic’s view on this.
In my mind there is absolutely no doubt that even the latest cars had the
rubber grommet. On later cars(chassis number above 20000) I’ve owned and studied with original carpets, they all had the rubber grommet around the auto shifter.

During restorations, I’ve transplanted a few rubber grommets
from original carpets onto the new carpet. If the piece is in good shape it can be done
but it requires a bit of work to free the grommet from the old carpet.
The reason for that is mainly that the grommet is joined with carpet using a process involving heat. So separating the piece from the carpet is difficult.
Wether it’s heat-shrinking or a sort of vulcanization process they used I don’t know.
But this is what makes replicating this process more complicated.
And why most carpet makers stick to the easy way, by sewing on the usual vinyl surround.
See attached picture of my 1971 Auto (VIN > 20000) with the "transplanted"
auto trans grommet on the new carpet piece.

Hans

Iconic · « **Reply #13 on:** January 28, 2018, 16:53:26 »

Thank you Hans !
Also, very nice job getting that rubber onto your new carpet. It looks great.
Both of the cars I have experience with had rubber "grommets" in factory installed carpet where the grommet looked exactly like yours, of course.

I hope Pawel and I can agree to disagree.

Pawel66 · « **Reply #14 on:** January 28, 2018, 17:16:56 »

Of course!
There were cars with rubber grommets!
There were also cars without them.

Maybe the difference waas related to some colours? Maybe to MBTex/Leather? I do not know. But both appeared on the cars. I htink it is difficult to deny...

Iconic · « **Reply #15 on:** January 28, 2018, 17:24:41 »

I thought we were going agree to disagree.

I am able to deny.

Pawel66 · « **Reply #16 on:** January 28, 2018, 17:59:50 »

I am not sure we agreed on what do we agree to disagree, actually...

Iconic · « **Reply #17 on:** January 28, 2018, 18:04:41 »

LOL, OK, I'll leave it at that.

Enjoy the ride !

doitwright · « **Reply #18 on:** January 28, 2018, 19:25:30 »

Now that we have that out of the way, whether all cars had them or not, if you know someone who has one the can be used to cast or at least measure to make a mold, I would appreciate it. Thank's ye'all.

Iconic · « **Reply #19 on:** January 28, 2018, 20:26:40 »

You are welcome to come over and take measurements (in my car) .... but you might actually need one in your hands to get this done.
Sorry for contributing to the hijack of your thread.

Pawel66 · « **Reply #20 on:** January 28, 2018, 21:38:39 »

Quote from: doitwright on January 28, 2018, 19:25:30

Now that we have that out of the way, whether all cars had them or not, if you know someone who has one the can be used to cast or at least measure to make a mold, I would appreciate it. Thank's ye'all.

Right! And if you spot one, please kindly let me know.

doitwright · « **Reply #21 on:** January 29, 2018, 23:10:24 »

Quote from: hkollan on January 28, 2018, 15:17:37

During restorations, I’ve transplanted a few rubber grommets
from original carpets onto the new carpet. If the piece is in good shape it can be done
but it requires a bit of work to free the grommet from the old carpet.
The reason for that is mainly that the grommet is joined with carpet using a process involving heat. So separating the piece from the carpet is difficult.
Wether it’s heat-shrinking or a sort of vulcanization process they used I don’t know.
But this is what makes replicating this process more complicated.
And why most carpet makers stick to the easy way, by sewing on the usual vinyl surround.
See attached picture of my 1971 Auto (VIN > 20000) with the "transplanted"
auto trans grommet on the new carpet piece.

Hans

Hans,

I see you are working on a restoration of a 68 now. Is it an auto trans?

hkollan · « **Reply #22 on:** January 30, 2018, 19:23:07 »

Hi,

The silver ‘68 is a manual trans car, so will be using one of the available reproduction grommets on that one.

Hans

waltklatt · « **Reply #23 on:** January 30, 2018, 20:20:00 »

Wow Hans, your 1971 is vin # 20000? That's a lot of zeros in there.
Congrats on getting a 'milestone' production number.
Did Mercedes do any of those milestone celebratory cars?
Like Volkswagen, Ford, Mini, Morris?

hkollan · « **Reply #24 on:** January 31, 2018, 18:16:12 »

Hi Walter,

Yeah that would be cool, but I am afraid no. What I was trying to say was that the car has a VIN > 20000 as in greater that 20000.
From memory its VIN ends in 20243. This relating to the suggestion that later cars did not have the rubber grommets. Still a fantastic car though! :-)

Hans

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Author Topic: Carpet rubber bushing grommet trim for automatic shift (Read 7156 times)