wooden headliner

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i have a very nice custom 1972 hardtop bus and would like to istall a nice wooden headliner, could anyone help me with some information on where i could get some literature or some kinda of ideas on how to do this myself, pictures, directions or something, thanks.

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baltic birch sheets from a marine supply house will work.

[Ry-dog]

Yes, I concur with the baltic birch sheets - I used the 1/8" thickness for my headliner. I used a rotozip to make the cuts which works very well with nice clean cuts. I stained them, then sealed with Minwax's Helmsman urethane. Hopefully you have a template or old headliner to trace. Good luck.

[salvaged_pinkslip]

"Baltic Birch" is good because it comes in 5'x5' sheets. The 4'x6' sheets of ordinary 1/8" plywood don't give you big enough pieces to do the job (at least for a bus with a poptop or sunroof).

But note - Baltic Birch has one stiff direction and one flexible direction. Make sure you cut it the right way. The first time I tried this I cut the pieces the wrong way. When I tried to bend them into place, the stress was too high and I ended up with Baltic Birch shrapnel everywhere!

The best way to get a template is to go to the self-serve junkyard and get the rotten split old wooden headliner piece out of a Westy. You can also look for the aluminum channel pieces that are used for joining the wooden headliner sections in a Westy. If you find a non-poptop Westy you will be in fat city, for the channels anyway.

I too used Helmsman, but frankly, I think some of the more forgiving polyurethanes would do just as well and maybe look better. It you're not a pureist [sp?] you can stain the Baltic Birch. I did mine to more-or-less match the color of the Westy funiture. It also makes the interior a little darker and cozier. A matter of preference, though.