We finally got some traction on the Pantera door panels. Because of the door poppers, we no longer need the door lock on the inside of the Pantera door.
The factory door panels were made of some kind of plastic/fiberglass material that hasn't stood the test of time very well. They were warped, cracked and brittle. So Jaime and I decided to go the hot rod route, and make our own, flat door panels. They don't wrap around like the factory ones did. This means that the door lock hole and surrounding metal will be exposed so they needed to be cleaned up and finished nicely.
In the pictures below, you can see the original door lock hole and surrounding, unfinished metal. I welded up the hole with new sheetmetal, filled the seams, sanded and repainted semi-gloss black. Jaime cut the new door panels out of wood, sewed up a new cover (half UltraSuede, half UltraLeather), put in the new panel clips and installed the new door panel.
