Sun Visor Rebuild-Recommendations?

[Shelby Griggs]

The sun visors on my 2001 are looking a little worse for wear, new ones seem unobtanium so looking at options. I looked at the LMC re-po's but they don't include a mirror on both sides AND the mirror cover doesn't match factory color.

I am thinking of having the OEM ones rebuilt and re-covered. Has anyone gone that route and if so any good shops you would recommend. I think these probably require more than your backyard upholstery shop for them to turn out looking good. Online search turns up a few possibilities and since I am striking out locally, probably going to have to be a higher end shop I ship the OEM visors to.

SHG

 

[BigPapa]

You can do them yourself. All you need is some headliner material. Wrap it around and tuck it in. Trim and glue as needed.

 

[Timd32]

I'm going to be doing mine in next few weeks. I have some extra headliner material I'm going to use.

Not sure how it will turn out, if I remember will share with you.

I did notice there are some stickers on the drivers side. Did not even read it.

I would think you could go to a local cruise night and find a vendor/person who does these locally.

 

[Hoopster]

There are a few youtube videos for Jeep Cherokee's out the the Rams are basically the same thing, can of spray glue and some headliner fabric (Joann's or Hobby Lobby ask for "Foam Backed Headliner material") do a search for "Jeep Cherokee Visor repair" and you will have a few.

I have done a few Jeeps it is straight forward no drama...

 

[Shelby Griggs]

Anything with fabric usually doesn't go well when I touch it, but thanks for the idea of a DIY. Actually, finding any local upholstery shop seems to be difficult locally, I know at least two have closed, one of which I had redo my headliner a few years back.

SHG

 

[Topzide]

@Shelby Griggs, Gotta think outside the box. I know you said the auto upholstery shops have closed around you, but what about a marine shop? Not sure how close you might be to some water? Plenty of them around me being located next to the Chesapeake Bay! You might even check with a sewing club/group. Good luck!

 

[Shelby Griggs]

@Shelby Griggs, Gotta think outside the box. I know you said the auto upholstery shops have closed around you, but what about a marine shop? Not sure how close you might be to some water? Plenty of them around me being located next to the Chesapeake Bay! You might even check with a sewing club/group. Good luck!

Good idea, except I live in Central Oregon in basically a desert, sewing group might exist, however?

SHG

 

[Shelby Griggs]

There are a few youtube videos for Jeep Cherokee's out the the Rams are basically the same thing, can of spray glue and some headliner fabric (Joann's or Hobby Lobby ask for "Foam Backed Headliner material") do a search for "Jeep Cherokee Visor repair" and you will have a few.

I have done a few Jeeps it is straight forward no drama...

So, I did watch a couple Jeep videos and it is actually easier than I thought, I assumed there was stitching involved and since there is not, I might have a chance at a 1/2 decent outcome

SHG

 

[Shelby Griggs]

Ordered some samples, none are an exact match to my headliner, so the hunt continues for matching material and then I will give try to recover myself.

 

[BigPapa]

Different strokes for different folks, but the material doesn’t always have to match. This is what my daughter chose to redo the headliner in her S10.

 

[Shelby Griggs]

I suppose they don't have to match, but for me I kind of would like them to!

 

[Shelby Griggs]

As a follow on question, has anyone sourced the airbag stickers that the factory put on? I haven't been able to find a source for OEM stickers, however I thought maybe there was a source for reproduction stickers. Trying to do a restoration back to factory look.

 

[BigPapa]

Are they actually stickers? I thought it was more of a silk screen.

 

[Shelby Griggs]

55350848AA LABEL, Air Bag Warning is listed in the 2001 parts book. So yes, it appears they are an actual seperate part that is a label.

 

[Matt42]

Different strokes for different folks, but the material doesn’t always have to match. This is what my daughter chose to redo the headliner in her S10.

View attachment 135436 View attachment 135437 View attachment 135438

Please, please pass my family's compliments to your daughter! That's clever and excellent work. Made me smile.

My daughter's first car was a 1983 AMC Concord. She was supposed to get her grandmother's 24 year old 1974 AMC Hornet, but Grammy turned left in front of a minivan a year before my daughter started driving. I kept the Hornet and used parts from it--including the headliner--to upfit the Concord. (Other parts of the Hornet live on in New Zealand.) I had suggested that my daughter paint excerpts of the Sistine Chapel on the headliner. But she did Disney characters instead.

 

[Shelby Griggs]

An update is in order. I did order material and recently got around to taking this on. I watched a lot of videos all showing the clam shell visors popping apart (looked easy on a Jeep visor which I would assume would be similar if not same on a Dodge Ram). Well, not the case on a 2001 Ram, those suckers are glued and glued good. I finally got the driver side about half popped apart, but then started cracking the plastic. One difficult area is the "well" where the mirror fits, that sucker is glued the entire perimeter and not easy to access toward the back of the well against the hinge side of the visor.

For now I have parked the project, even if you can get this thing apart, there is a lot of dried glue to clean up and then re-gluing it back together it seems to me these were NOT made to easily split open and recover.

I am back on the hunt for replacements, NOS OEM prefered or good quality aftermarket. The only aftermarket ones I am aware of are from LMC truck, and not an exact match, but better than no visor I suppose.

This was supposed to be an quick easy project, but all I have is a 1/2 destroyed driver visor to show for my efforts so far.

SHG

 

[BigPapa]

I don’t understand what you’re trying to pry apart? Do you have the lit flip up mirror? You take it apart and remove it, then wrap the material around the visor and tuck it in. No prying apart. Do you have a link to one of these videos?

 

[Shelby Griggs]

I don’t understand what you’re trying to pry apart? Do you have the lit flip up mirror? You take it apart and remove it, then wrap the material around the visor and tuck it in. No prying apart. Do you have a link to one of these videos?

All these modern visors from any make are like a clamshell. The fabric wraps around the top and bottom of the visor and you tuck the ends in on the non hinge side of the visor and shut the clamshell. In my case that isn't clipped, it is epoxied at all the contact points on the inside of each 1/2 of the clamshell.

All the videos I watched show popping the clam open, replacing the fabric then reating the two 1/2's of the clamshell.

I don't think you can be successful in replacing the fabric whiteout splaying that clamshell open?

Here is a link to one of the shortest YouTube videos on how this works on a Jeep.

SHG

 

[BigPapa]

I’ll show that video to our upholstery guy at work and see what he says, but the ones I’ve done, you don’t pop it apart, just tuck the material in between.

 

[Shelby Griggs]

Update time. The two halves are indeed glued together with some sort of strong glue, probably an epoxy.

Here is my 2001 Ram visor as it was, with fabric removed and showing the inside view. All the internal ribs were glued together, a major pain to separate cleanly without too much damage. All the whiter areas are glue residue.




I also found this you tube video relating to a BMW sun visor which is very similar to the 2001 Ram.

SHG