How to repair your dash! (Lot of pics)

[lee01]

Ok, this is a fairly long post.
This is my way of repairing my cracked dash the''easy way''
If you are into show car and 100 points car, look away!! This method is for a driver car! Because you don't get the factory look or texture.

I hope you find it informative. The key is in prep.
I took my about 6 hour to do. This include diasssemblie, prep, repair, paint and refurbished radio, bezel and little parts. So its not hard, a good day of work.
My personnal cost for this job 0$.  I had all the produts I needed.
So, you need:
Sanding paper; 40, 80, 180
Sanding block (optional, but this will help have a straiter dash)
Degraiser (I use brake cleaner in a spray can)
Black sandable primer spay can
Black gravel guard spay can
Black vinyl paint
Automotive bondo, yes bondo!
Bondo spreader

Step 1

Remove all accessories and part that you don't want to have paint on and clean all the dash with degraiser.


Step 2

You need to get ride of all the dash dry broken part. Use a little screwdriver and tap around the damage area. This way you will get rid of any too dry part of the dash. Take out as much as you need. This is avoid to have more crack. My dash had the edge broken, so I use cyanoacrylate (krazy glue) with a accelerator (bond quicker) to glue this back. We do not reuse old part of the dash. (picture is to shown produts)



Step 3

You need to clean the edge of the repair area. You need to unsharped the edge. Like in my picture. You can use 40 grit sandpaper or a dremel tool. Then sand the area you around the repair area.




Step 4

Clean with degraiser once again, and prepare a batch of bondo. Don't put too much at once. Spread the bondo evenly



Step 5

Once your bondo as dried, sand it with a 40 grit paper to start with, then 80 and 180. Once your done, apply a light coat of sandable primer (also called a guide coat). This will tell you high and low spot on your work. This step will help you with the hard to see imperfection. When done, applied a couple more coat of primer to cover the repair.







Step 6

Now, this is the part you need room to move.
Reinstall glove box panel, ashtray and steering column panel, (I know I forget my column panel d'oh)
You want them to blend in
Dust off your dash and make sure your dash and workling area is clean and dust free.
Grab your Gravel guard spray can and spray your dash. Now you need to be at about 20 inch from your dash. Spray evenly in light coat only!!! You might need 2-4 very light coat. It will look weird at first, but when it dry you will see a better result don't worry.





Step 7

This step is the last.
Now i'm doing my dash in black. But if you doing with colored dash like blue, red or tan, the step is almost the same, you just need to buy a vinyl die of your choice. If your doing with color, use a grey primer.

When the gravel guard as dried, now you need to apply 2-3 light coat of primer (in my case it was a black primer). This will help get the best end result.

When the primer is dry, take your vinyl spray can and spray your dash. Again 2-4 light coats.

When dry, inspect and reinstall.





Well hope this help.

[Joker (§ir£Ðragon)]

Very nice! Thank you for posting this. As you know my dash is bad and I need some way to do something with it.

I juat have a couple of questions for you. Now remember I'm not a body guy so I have very little knowlege here so my questions may seem dumb.

I know the texture is different than that of stock. Is it as rough as it appears in the pics or is that due to the flash? Can it be sanded smoother before priming?

What type of vinyl paint did you use? I know a lot of people have been suggesting the SEM. How does the primer react to the vinyl paint or vice-versa?

Lastly what about the difference in expansion rate between the dash pad and the bondo? Is there any problem with cracking or separating when the dash expands in the heat or sunlight? And I guess along the same lines, what about the difference in the padding? My biggest problem is the corner to the right of the inst. bezel so it's a very exposed area that I would need to fill.

[ta78w72]

When I first started reading this thread I thought "this is going to end up looking like crap", and when the paint was wet I thought that's what would happen.  But the finished product looks really, really good.  You saved about $1,000 from the just dashes price and it looks great!  Fantastic!

[rkellerjr]

Excellent post, thanks! That dash looks brand new.

[wheels78ta]

Excellent work on that dash.  And thanks for the Tech write up and pictures.   

[turbota400]

Now that's intuition at it's finest.  Thanks for the info lee01!

[Eagle 1]

Hey looks pretty good.  I have an old dash that needs some repair, so I might fix it and sell it someday.

[brian c]

Looks like a good result. One question...did you look into using the texture paints they sell at Walmart instead of the gravel gaurd?

I think it has a finer texture to it so it might be an alternative. I might consider doing this on the 80 bird at some point as it definitely has possibility.

[lee01]

Looks like a good result. One question...did you look into using the texture paints they sell at Walmart instead of the gravel gaurd?

I think it has a finer texture to it so it might be an alternative. I might consider doing this on the 80 bird at some point as it definitely has possibility.

I did try the HEMI paint, the paint use on Hemi valve cover, not a really good texture, atleast for the dash.

The ''stone'' like paint that you can buy at Walmart or otherhardware store I havent try. The grain would probably be smaller and closer to a oe look..

[lee01]

Very nice! Thank you for posting this. As you know my dash is bad and I need some way to do something with it.

I juat have a couple of questions for you. Now remember I'm not a body guy so I have very little knowlege here so my questions may seem dumb.

I know the texture is different than that of stock. Is it as rough as it appears in the pics or is that due to the flash? Can it be sanded smoother before priming?

What type of vinyl paint did you use? I know a lot of people have been suggesting the SEM. How does the primer react to the vinyl paint or vice-versa?

Lastly what about the difference in expansion rate between the dash pad and the bondo? Is there any problem with cracking or separating when the dash expands in the heat or sunlight? And I guess along the same lines, what about the difference in the padding? My biggest problem is the corner to the right of the inst. bezel so it's a very exposed area that I would need to fill.

My vinyl dye was an old Plastikote can that I bought at some Autopart store couple year ago.
I got no problem with dye over primer.

If you keep the bondo at a minimum, you won't have problem. As far for the heat goes...can't tell on the long run, well maintain I don't see a problem. I seen bondo on car at hot place with no failure.
When you need to fill up an area, better to lay thin coat instead of big and heavy one. Also when ''building'' with bondo, make sure to give bondo alot of adhesion, sand with 40 grit paper, apply your bondom sand with 40 repeat.

For the rough look, you can sand down on the primer, but not the texture gravel guard. You can prime/sand a couple time you get the texture you want.
There also other texture product on the market other than the gravel guard with a finer look.

[Hitman]

Nice looking work... and hey.... now you can throw rocks at your dash and not worry about it.... :-)

[Tinman5]

Nice looking work... and hey.... now you can throw rocks at your dash and not worry about it.... :-)

LMAO...thanks for the visual, Brett...I guess you could drive behind gravel trucks backwards with the windows down and t-tops off with impunity.

That said, it's a very creative and inexpensive way to salvage an otherwise trashed dash pad.  I have one I was going to toss, I may want to give this a try.

Tinman5

[LonestaR]

Real nice Lee01, i will be archiving this on my harddrive (pdf print).

Achieving these guides would be nice "78ta forum guide book"

[jphillips3333]

Lee01 said he'll do anyone's dash for $250 - you'd pay shipping both ways.  Kidding, I didn't talk to Lee01 but good work bub.

[jcurrieta]

what ever happen to ppl putting stickers on them to hide the crack jeeessss guys we have to perpetuate the regional steriotype of a trans am owner. Get out the harley stickers or hooker ones. hahah

actually i have a oldschool vinyl dash repair kit my dad gave me (not sure where it came from) but its got patches in it so you can create the proper grain on the fill you put in,,,this patch could work to recreate the the grain even when useing bondo when its almost dry.