1953 Rover P4 75
June 2019 - Rear seat and miscellany
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Door sills
The P4 originally had molded rubber door sills that covered all the visible metal from the sill edge up to the carpet. All body mount bolts, spot welds and bottom hinge screws were normally hidden. Reproductions of these rubber covers are not available, but I opted to use Herculiner truck bed liner for the bottom of the door sills instead of covering it with rubber. This guarantees any water that finds its way on the door sills will not be trapped in between the rubber and the metal causing rust issues again.
Bumpers
Fortunately both the front and rear bumpers were in decent condition and did not require re-chroming. The steel frame for the bumpers were removed, stripped and repainted before installation.
Now the front of the car looks complete! Note that the bumpers that came with this P4 are not the original 1953 bumpers. The outriggers were more square and the license plate bracket in between the outriggers were different. What came with this car appear to be late 1950s bumpers. The original was swapped out for some reason in the past.
Front fender (wing) splash seals
New reproduction steel retainers and rubber seals were purchased from the UK and installed to seal the gap between the front fenders (wings) and the body behind the front tires. It was hard to find pictures of this for comparison since most of them tend to be very dirty or rusty, so this picture shows what they should look like in new condition.
Rear seats
Like the front seat, the rear seat started life as a donor from another car since the original was long gone when I bought this P4. I pulled a rear bench seat out of a 1980s GMC/Chevy van to use the frame as a starting point.
The rear bench seat was cut down the center and reduced in length to fit, and had to be notched on the rear corners to clear the rear wheel wells.
Bottom rear seat frame is done and tucks in like the original. There are metal brackets below the seat frame that slide down inside the rim of the seat floor on the body to keep the seat secure in position even though it is not bolted in at all.
Both front and rear seats now have foam carved to size and ready for new upholstery.
Floor padding
New 40 oz thick auto carpet padding was cut to size and installed.