Replacing Your 10+ Year Old Carpet

[oompahlumpa]

Tools/Materials required:

? New molded carpet from Auto Custom Carpets (www.accmats.com). Can be found cheaper at www.automotiveinteriors.com.

? Various sockets and screwdrivers

? Torx T-40 bit.

? Box knife or Carpet knife

? Scissors

Before getting started:

? The molded carpets come rolled up in a box, so a few days prior to installing it, you may want to remove it from the box and lay it flat to get out any severe wrinkles.

? After the old carpet is removed from the car, some people take the opportunity to remove all the black tarry sound-deadening material in order to reduce the overall weight of the car. I chose not to, because it seems like a lot of tedious messy work, and I don?t particularly enjoy road noise.

The process:

? Remove everything from the interior: Front seats, rear-bottom seat cushion, center console, dead-pedal, door sills, gas-tank/hatch release levers, etc.

? Unbolt the hood-release lever.

? Remove all the plastic retaining screws holding the carpet in (there are several up under the dash, and under the rear seat cushion).

? You will also have to remove 2 metal brackets from where the metal center-console supports are attached to the floor of the car.

? Remove the old carpeting.

? Remove the old carpet padding.

? Lay the original carpet on top of the new carpet, and line them up as best you can.

? Using a permanent marker of some sort, trace the holes from the old carpet to the new carpet. Make sure to trace well inside the holes edges. For one, most of the stock holes are just plain larger than they need to be, but also, if you make the holes smaller, you can trim them later if needed, but if you make the holes too big, you?re S.O.L.!

? Cut the holes out of the new carpet and trim the outer edges. I just used scissors to do this, but it was very difficult to cut through the under-padding. Make sure to get ALL the holes, including the ones for the seat bolts, and the seat-belt sensor wiring, and the gas tank/hatch release levers, etc.

? Test-fit the carpet and trim as required. Once you are satisfied, vacuum the new carpet to get rid of any fuzzy stuff, then, make sure all the wiring is routed through the proper holes, and re-install everything in the opposite order that you removed it.

Information provided by: 4thgenerationcivic.com