I have a 1979 Cutlass with cracks near where the dash meets the windshield. I pulled the windshield out. Just to let folks know I called Just Dashes who can repair/revinyl it close to OEM. They want $2500. This is not worth it. Like a buddy told me, you could buy a whole car with a nice dash pad for that kind of money.

So have some some research on the internet of what fixes are out there.

Would like some advice on fixes and how they held up over time..

Specific areas:

1. Deep Dash crack

What is best way to fix? I have seen super glue with baking soda, Glue with micro bubbles, industrial foam, epoxy like (west systems), plastic welding rod... for a long term fix that holds.. Any experiences?

2. Less deep, multiple





cracks.

Same thing, how to fix?

3. What to use to make a vinyl like top sealing over the crack fix?? I have seen hot with a soldering iron, and hot cure compound. Also have seen two part catylist type compounds.
Any experiences?


3. Graining

I'd like to match factory grain as best I can. Any experiences with this?? Does anyone know grain style mold for dash?? I have seen grain copying techniques, anyone ever do this??


4. Looking for specific brands, techniques, experiences, failures, what has held up??


Thanks for any advice,

Fred

 

70-72 dash pads have a "pebble grain" finish. Earlier have leather/ vinyl grains that look similar to actual material. I saw an easy solution to fixing a pebble grain finish on YouTube and it works great. I filled all cracks and molded in a new part on my 72 pad. I used two part body panel bonding adhesive to fill/ repair, but any 2 part epoxy should work. Once filled/ shaped, sand the repairs smooth. Then paint the dash with a paint roller (like you would use inside your house) with a thick paint. The roller puts grain back into the finish. I was skeptical when I saw the video, but it works really well. Not sure how it will work on a vinyl type grain. Just dashes is the only place I know of that restores these. Most people think they are simply covered in material but they are actually vacuum formed around a foam core which is why just dashes charges so much. Here are the only pics I could find of my dash pad. I fixed several spots on the top and molded in the area for the shifter where the headlight **** was. Once finished, I sprayed it with vinyl dye.

 

There are many youtube videos on fixing them. Search "Datsun 280z dash repair". The Z cars seem to be the worst and the owners seem to be the cheapest

..... then when you realize what a PIA it is, find a clean donor dash for your car from a colder climate. It won't be that hard.....lol

(I looked into doing it myself. It's not that hard but it takes a while. It just takes a lot of steps)

 

Drill holes at the end of all cracks before filling them in order to stop their direction of travel.

A local NAPA in NJ can get custom colors in a spray can with bumper flex agent. It is lacquer, I don't know if lacquer would be ok on dash. Someone that knows about using lacquer please comment.

Good luck!!!

 

Here's an older thread with a couple of options.

https://classicoldsmobile.com/forums...repair-143071/

Make sure you clean the dahs with Dawn dish soap, scrub it with degreaser and spray it with adhesion promoter before spraying/rolling the color on it.

 

I would just change the complete dash... The dash pad, in and of itself, is the same from 1978 through 1988... Also, if you are just looking for a clean fix and not so much originality there are various dash pad overlays available, not that I would recommend them, just that they are available for an easy repair...

 

WOW looks really great! My challange is that I am trying to match factory grain and appearance. different grain in 1979 Cutlass it seems. But you did a great job, Outstanding very retro but not over the top

 

$1500 for a replacement dash! others for less are just as bad as mine.. front part of mine is pretty good , its the top that sucks.. why I am not to gun ho to replace out the whole thing.. Where the crappiest stuff is will most of the time be covered by a dash mat. also I think dash caps look hokey if you look close...

https://countryroadautoparts.com/nos...ashboard-dash/

 

Questions, anyone have any experience with;

1. Filling the dash cracks? I've seen 2 part plastic epoxy(JB weld) , West Systems epoxy, Microballoons with super glue, gorilla glue, air dry vinyl glue, bondo, and finally plastic welding.

I'm leaning towards using Polyvance FiberFlex and plastic welding, also could use on a plastic bumper that needs a fix too.

Any ideas of how any of these hold up?? Also do the show up after the fix in the sun??? it's called "telegraphing" a term used by the vette body fix it guys, i.e. the fix shows up in the heat because the fix material expands at a different rate the the original base material..

2. After the crack fix/fill how to top and match the original vinyl grain. I am leaning towards a heat cure vinyl compound. Any favorites?? Application tips?

3. Re-graining to match the original Madrid dash vinyl. Anyone have any experience with this?. Graining paper used and from who??

Thanks for any specific help, even who to contact..

Fred

 

So it seems no one has tackled such a difficult and large project, and trying to match the factory grain.. I'm quite the experimenter, so here goes..

So after tons of searching on the internet, and the vinyl repair products available , all said their products are not intended to fix large areas like this.

I bought a few products from Polyvance, and Vinyl Pro to experiment with.

I bought a Polyvance Fiber Flex kit with iron, and from Vinyl Pro, I bought the Fitz's High Strength Compound and graining paper.

One thing I learned is that none of the sellers had a way of correlating a manufacturers grain to a specific graining paper. A most you would find a grouping of generic GM, Ford, Honda, graining, etc. I know mine is Madrid grain and found one of the packet of graining papers from Vinyl Pro seems close.

One of the questions I wondered about was how much heat should it take to set the repair vinyl compound.

So watching a lot of repair videos, etc the sellers like the hawk special tools like special heat guns and Irons. One Iron heats to 700F degree. Why question, it is needed to get that hot to cure the compound? I only saw one spec for one vinyl compound that had fiberglass in it, and they recommended 570F Deg. to cure it. I am not using compound. BUt I saw no other spec for other types of vinyl compounds.

I used a old clothes iron which got up to 232F and the Polyvance Iron got up to 314F.






I used both and they both seemed to cure the High Strength Compound OK.


The Fitz's High Strength compound is white, so I sprayed it with some black vinyl paint to see the grain better.

I do not think you need 700F degree to cure it..

Fred.

 

Did some more experimenting with the Polyvance FiberFlex rod

I found that even a clothes iron will melt it, as well as the Polyvance Iron.




I also found I could make a grain in the FiberFlex.

I smoothed out the FiberFlex as best I could, then used a heat gun on the flattened FiberFlex until it just gets shiney, then put the grain paper on it immediately, then put my autobody dolly on it to cool it and smooth out the area. I learned that the FiberFlex is much more sticky then the Vinyl Compound and it is hard to remove the graining paper with out it embedding to the repair. This took some practice to get the right balance of heat, pressure and cooling to get it to grain nicely. But I think the way to go is just with the FiberFlex as it has a very close feel like the original vinyl dash, and only one type of repair material to deal with. Not trying to get the vinyl compound to stick to the FiberFlex. Just using one fix material. It seems more durable and strong then the vinyl compound and hopefully will hold up in the sun. Drawbacks I see is making a nice uniform grain fix, and how well will it blend the graining into an existing dash vinyl repair edge. Blend will probably will not be as good as the vinyl compound as it is thinner. But the FiberFlex does seem to kinda melt into the existing vinyl. I also found that if the grain does not take, just reheat the area and try again.. More experimentation coming up..

 

Thanks for sharing your testing and experiences with us, Fred!

 

OK working on the graining FiberFlex some more

I bought the large graining papers from Vinyl Pro, as with such a large area I am thinking to make a continuous graining as long as possbile without a graining break.. The papers are probably not as durable as the graining pads but could not find a graining pad with as close a match as the graining paper.

The problem with the paper is that , it is paper.

I watched a ton of videos. IT seems there are just two ways of graining with heat.

One is by placing the graining paper down on the smoothed out FiberFlex fix area and heating it by placing a heating iron on top of it, then cooling it with a dollie.. Doing it this way, the paper graining material embeds into the FiberFlex and cannot be removed nicely if at all.




The second, is to heat the smoothed out FiberFlex fix area with a heat gun until the repair area is shiney and uniform, then quickly put the graining paper down and then cooling it with a dollie. Again I found, the paper is difficult to remove and leave a nice grain.




I remembered hearing about mold release agents, did some searches and came up with using PAM cooking spray. OK lets try that. So on the graining side I sprayed some PAM, and swished it around a bit with a paper towel so I had a very thin uniform coating on the graining side of the paper. I heated the smoothed out FiberFlex fix area with a heat gun until the repair area is shiney and uniform, then quickly put the PAM oiled graining paper side down and then cooled it with a dollie. This seemed to work, but as expected there was an oily residue when the paper was removed. Before I vinyl paint it, I'll have to clean the PAM off with some type of wax and grease remover. Hopefully not too much PAM embeded into the FiberFlex so the vinyl paint can stick. YEs , there are some small bubbles in the grain, seems to happen when one is heating the FiberFlex with the heat gun to get it shiney and moldable. Again, not as nice as the vinyl compound when grained, but much more tough. Very difficult to make a dent with a fingernail after the FiberFlex is set. Very dash vinyl like hardness. Standby for more adventures...

 

Wanted to see how well the FiberFlex would stick to the dash vinyl, got a small piece of the dash vinyl, sanded right side with 80 grit to see if it would make a difference in adhesion..



So Polyvance says to heat one side of the FiberFlex rod and then flip it over, then melt and press the FiberFlex into the repair area with the iron.. Did that. Let it cool, I tried to separate the FiberFlex from the dash vinyl, seems very stick on it. Did not see an adhesion difference between sanded verses un-sanded areas. Read " FiberFlex is not a true welding rod, but rather a thermoplastic or hot-melt adhesive" kinda like brazing..

 

Test of FiberFlex in the sun.

Left a sample in sun for hours. Pushed down with a fingernail hard. left a very small dent, but mostly resisted forming a mark..

Slightly softer then dash vinyl but not too bad..

 

I have a 1977 Cutlass Supreme Brougham with a saddle colored interior. My dash is really nice, but I have about 7 0r 8 mini cracks and a couple of them are where the windshield meets the dash. I found a really old dash that was pretty beat up and sent it to Just Dashes. $2200 later I just received my newly done dash color matched and all. I am going to have my mechanic and some of his crew install the new one. I should try it myself but thought having them do it would save me a ton of stress and frustration. It is scheduled for next week and we will see how it goes.

 

Probably the way to go for a great Dash repair. I just didn't want to spend the $2500 they quoted me, not including shipping.. My existing dash is great from the front, it is just near windshield area that meets the dash that is the problem. Enjoy your dash!

Fred

 

Fred,

I totally agree with you. I was nuts to go ahead and do this. To top it all off the lead time on getting a dash done is 5-6 months. My dash was easily a 9 out of 10 but the little cracks annoyed the hell out of me so I went ahead with it.
I guess we shall see if it was all worth it

Sal

 

OK now really doing it. I removed all the cracked vinyl dash area to the foam to the point where I wanted the fix to meet the existing vinyl on the dash..





Sanded the edges down of the existing vinyl to have a blending edge. Next I blew off the area as well as vacuuming to get all the crud out of the foam. Then wiped off with SEM vinyl prep. Let it dry overnight.




OK 1st day of putting the Fiberflex on. Once again, FiberFlex is never intended to fix such a large area. tried, learned some things..

First I wanted to really embed the FiberFlex into the old foam, and the existing vinyl edge. I heated up the FiberFlex stick with a Heat Gun and a heated up the repair area a bit too. Then used the Polyvance iron to really push into the foam and even under the existing vinyl a bit. Then smoothed it out as best I could with the Polyvance iron a bit at a time. The fix had a lot of high and low spots. I needed to fill the fix to make it more level. I would heat up the FiberFlex stick with a Heat Gun and hold the rod with a pair of pliers, when it starts to met it sags I am laying down lots of FiberFlex at a time now to fill. I warmed up the area where I am going to lay the hot FiberFlex stick down. I laid the it down, heated it up a bit more with the heat gun, and then used a clothes iron (old non-steam)on the hottest setting, and smoothed out the FiberFlex as best I could. When hot, it seems the FiberFlex is kinda like bondo when you put it on, kind of hard to make it perfectly smooth with no ups or downs.. More filling needed.

 

OK back on it learning how to work with Fiberflex, build up areas, etc I learned one needs to make different size fiberflex. Like doubling it up, speading it out to make a thin coat, etc before applying it. Cut out shape of what you need to build up. Heat up the area a bit with heat gun before application, and also the fiberflex, then apply to area , then spread out with airless hot iron. In between, shape with 40 to 80 grit sandpaper. then fill more..

 

totally gave up on this idea coul dnot make it look right, bought a dash cap although it looks and fits like crap

 

This may be well know to you all, but I used just dashes many years ago with factory results.

Wasn’t cheap then, probably won’t be now, but I can vouch for the quality (well, as of 20 years ago). If someone has had different experience in recent years, I’d like to know.

https://www.justdashes.com

The trick is they did/do vacuum form grained vinyl over foam as the factory did.

Costly, yeah. But you see the dash every time you get in the car. I’ve had my cars for decades, over that time-scale, it pencils out no problem.

Chris

 

I just watched a video on YT yesterday where a guy did the dash on a 70's mopar. There were big sections missing and/or large cracks. After grinding, prepping, sanding like you did he used expandable spray foam insulation to fill the large areas and then shaped it all down after it cured. From there it was mostly like body work on an exterior panel would be done. The only thing that it didn't adress was exactly reproducing the original grain. I think he used a vinyl freindly paint for the final coat.

 

They reproduce dashes for 1978-88 Monte Carlo for about $700 but not for Cutlasses even though more Cutlasses were produced some years Go figure..