An arm resting development

One of the common problems with B-bodys like the Impala is that the arm rests aren't as strong as they could be.  After 20 years of using them to shut the doors, the plastic is often cracked and they don't stay in place.  The arm rests on the Impala were particularly bad(and, ironically, in perfect condition on the Mighty Caprice™).  The plastic base was very cracked, the screw holes broken out, the vinyl cover torn, and on the Driver's side, someone had drilled new holes through it in an attempt to keep it in place(also, both were so discolored that they got a coat of SEM to get them looking nice again).  Eventually, this can lead to a cracked door panel too, as it sees some of the pulling forces.

 

On my passenger's side, the whole broken area was cut out so only the vinyl cover was holding the armrest on.  You can see too that someone at some point used a whole bunch on really short screws to try to hold the cover back on.  It actually works well enough that I'll leave those alone.

A permanent fix for this is so simple I can't believe I've never seen it discussed before.   I just bent up a piece of 16ga sheetmetal and screwed it down.  The armrest hold down screws go through the sheetmetal so that when you pull on the arm rest, all the load gets transferred through the metal piece into the door.  I also taped the sheetmetal to the armrest with 3M double stick foam tape, making the sheetmetal and plastic arm rest essentially one piece.  In order for this to fail, the whole armrest would need to be cracked in half.

We still need to do something about the top side though.  I wanted the arm rests clamped down tight so they wouldn't move at all, and wouldn't stress the door panel any.  Plus, there were tears and extra holes my vinyl.  So, I got some 1"x1/8" aluminum and started hacking away.  While I was at it, I upgraded from the original sheetmetal type hold down screws to countersunk stainless 1/4-20s, 1" long.  The J-nuts on the door were changed to match.  The thickness of the aluminum plate allows for a nice countersink.

With everything in place and tightened down, the arm rests are rock solid.  The arm rest and door panel are sandwiched between the door and the aluminum plate, and everything is solid enough that you can really crank it tight.   Never again will I have to worry about someone using the arm rest instead of the door pull to close the door and never again will an arm rest come off in my hand.