How to Repair a Car’s Ceiling Headliner
During automobile restructuring and reinstallation customers often ask that how to repair car’s ceiling headliner. For those who are unfamiliar; the headliner of the car refers to the ceiling or the roof when you look upwards. As you go back to history you will find that till 1976 there was only one kind of car’s ceiling headliner used in all cars and later on its versions were changed and enhanced. Typically a headliner was a stitched fabric that was adjusted by bows or pockets fixed to the different areas in the car at the top.
Customers often find many problems associated with car’s ceiling headliner that is usually made up of flurry fabric with foam at its back stuck to a board. With the span of time the headliner starts to deteriorate causing problems. Initially the foam at its back starts drying out which is apparently not visible to the naked eye. With the lack of adhesive the material stuck to the foam separates and eventually starts to fall off. As a result you might see small inflated portions hanging at the top of the roof giving an unpleasant view and by that time there is no quick solution to fix it. For a repair, car’s ceiling headliner has to be removed from the top, cleaned well and then new fabric has to be used in place. Customers often ask to glue it up again but this is not possible because with time old foam at the back accumulates sticky dirt in it; not allowing the previous material to stick back properly.
The repair of car’s ceiling headliner starts with the removal of trim molding around the headliner at the top. All the things attached to the headliner have to be removed at the first place that includes dome lights and sun visors. Different cars have some other details involved in their ceiling headliner repair but here only the common practices and methods will be discussed.
When all the pieces attached to the board of headliner are removed it will drop down a little. If it does not drop down then you have to see whether the board was attached with the Velcro or some other putty. Try to pull it down from the sides carefully; if the board does not come down easily or is hard to move then it means that the skin of roof was stuck with some putty glue. In that case you should not take the risk to damage the car’s ceiling headliner because inappropriate tools and lack of knowledge can pay you heavily. It is advised to consult a technician or take the car to a repair shop before repairing the headliner by yourself.
