I spent a couple hours this afternoon working on the map box door. I'm not happy with the standard Vans design where the door sits on top of the instrument panel, and would much rather have a door that sits flush. But this is a lot more work.
To have a flush fitting door then first I needed to make up something for it to close against. I fitted a section of angle to the inside top of the map box, and inset it by the thickness of the instrument panel (0.062"). I then cut and fitted a short section of piano hinge along the bottom, also insetting it by 0.062". See the first picture below.
The second picture below shows how I want the door to look, however, due to the piano hinge arrangement, the bottom picture is how it will look in practice. I don't like that you can see so much of the hinge, so I'm going to search for a different style. I need a hinge that opens outward and gives the door some clearance from the panel.
This is gonna take a while!
The angle piece at the top of the map box gives the flush fitting door something to close against
This is the look I'm after ..............
........ but this is the look I get when using a piano hinge. Not pretty!
