twillis004

Trying to get the Dash Pad off my 1970 442. non AC. I've looked at some online stuff. there an old post of how to remove a cutlass supreme dash, but mines a little different. any good resources out there that I can look at. I cant seem to separate the pad from the main dash housing

scrappie

Yours shouldn't be different from any other 70-72 cutlass/442. It is not for the faint of heart. Easiest to take seats out and lay on your back to get underneath. Hardest nut to get top left corner but a lot is removed through font instrument holes and glove box area. Take your time and have patience.

twillis004

thanks Scrappie, so far that is what I have done. I'll just have to keep at it

Allan R

This is for an AC car, but lose the AC and it's the same. That top left corner of the dash BTW doesn't have a nut on the mounting post. It's friction fit through a metal grommet and a good tug once the rest of the dash posts are free will take it out. I took out 2 dashes from 2 1970 non AC cars a couple years ago. The biggest thing was remove the electrical harness from the mounting clips that hold it to the dash. After that it was ezpz.

https://thisoldscar.wordpress.com/20...-part-i-of-ii/

https://thisoldscar.wordpress.com/20...part-ii-of-ii/

scrappie

That is a great set of links Allan and should help the OP step by step.

twillis004

Perfect. I had that article printed out and was using it, then I noticed I didnt have all the interior lights it was talking about, so I thought maybe mine was different. The article is a cutlass supreme. I thought mine might be different. I stopped when I got to the wiring harness, but sounds like I need to unhook it. doesnt look easy.

Thanks for the help. I'll post my results for someone in the future.

Allan R

It took me about 3 hours to get the dash out without breaking any of the posts. Only one of the nuts was hard to get out - the one on the left side of the heater control module and I believe they are all 1/4"? Other than that it was just very time consuming slow labor. I didn't have that tutorial to use when i did the removal so I was very careful and slow, and had to use my LED light to see where everything was routed. There IS a short cut to the wiring - and that's to remove it with the fuse block intact. but that's also a lot of work IMO. On cars with courtesy lights the one thing that would be a pain is the light in the rearview mirror as that lead needs to be separated from the loom (connector) because it runs up the the left side of the A pillar trim.

I had everything unhooked and it was a desperation time to get that left side loose. I looked everywhere for where it was hung up and finally decided at the risk of damaging the dash pad I'd just give it a solid tug. It popped out no problem and I could see the metal grommet it seats into it fastened to the subframe metal dash. A learning experience that's not detailed anywhere in the CSM or AM. Experience in some cases is king.

Those cars were also non AC, and somewhat easier to work on because of the reduced amount of ducting and vacuum lines. Personally I like the non AC cars, but I would have loved if the factory had used the center of the dash to allow plain old air flow. All it requires is a take off from the heater plenum to run up top. But then, I'm not an engineer. Just a guy who thinks practically.

Allan R

This also might help