LS1Porch

I searched, and realize it isn't just a bolt-on affair, but i was curious if anyone had been successful and what they had done.

Long story short, i have 2 dashes: an "all-leather" option lower half and an un-cracked black upper half, and if there was ever a time to swap it, that time would be now

TIA!

ehall

They are one piece. You could potentially remove the lower upholstery and re -attach to the good upper, but the dash itself is one solid piece.

LS1Porch

Yeah, that's kind of what i had gathered. When i was searching a few people said they were working on it, though. I was thinking it might be possible to cut each in half, then spot-weld the two halves together or something. Re-covering was also a thought, but i'm not sure i want to go to those lengths

I guess as a final option i could just paint the lower half black (so my entire dash is black) and then just swap the rest of it in there.

ehall

If you have the ability to cut it in half and reweld it, I think that would be pretty easy. That said, the metal is fairly thin, so I guess you'd have to be careful. Whatever you do, don't paint the stiched lower. I'd be all for that if it were vinyl, but if it's stitched it's leather. That's a keeper.

LS1Porch

If i take the painting option, i would just paint the lower half of my good upper dash (which is vinyl).

ehall

No prob then. Get SEM satin black vinyl dye...about 8 bucks. Get a bottle of SEM Vinyl Prep # 38344. Use that first. Let dry. Spray dye. done.

aribop

I took the lower leather wrapped pieces off of one dash and transplanted them onto another dash. Not hard to do and cannot tell it was ever done. I would not cut a dash in half and try to weld it.

ehall

Albert,
Can you give a quick description of what you did? Did you need to use some sort of adhesive remover? How did you put it back on? Stuff like that. TIA

And good to see ya around the board.

LS1Porch

+1

DrZ1

If you decide to "paint" you could dye. I purchased some from a company Colorplus. You can Google them, They have the exact paint color's, or can send you some swatches.

STeve

aribop

The leather will come off with the foam backing. I just started peeling it away working my fingers in between the foam and the dash. I also used a putty knife in some areas. It actually came off pretty easy. I then did the same with the vinyl from the other dash. I cleaned up the remnants of foam from the receiving dash and trial fit the leather pieces. I used 3M super spray adhesive and sprayed the dash and the back of the leather trim foam. Allowed it to set for a bit and then placed the leather piece on the dash.
I will post some pictures later as I don't have them on this computer.
Cheers,
Albert

ehall

Thanks for the info and the pics too come. That might make one of my potential projects worth doing.

joe_951Turbo

+1 on the vinyl dye. I've it a number of times and it really comes out nice. Take your time and do a number of light layers and nobody will notice that you changed the original color. And its a durable product.

LS1Porch

Thanks for the update, aribop. I'll be doing this soon, so maybe i'll document the procedure.

For my side panels i'll need to use the dye, so i'll pick up some of that SEM stuff...thanks for all the input!

ehall

Make sure that you get the other product that I posted. You want the panels as clean of contaminants as possible.