The dash pad in my 88 Iroc is badly cracked (aren't they all?)

I removed it today and have been going over some ideas in my head. I'm going to re-vinyl it and try to make some custom speaker grills and vents out of some wire mesh. Not sure how it is going to turn out, but I thought I would start up this thread and post progress pics as I work on it. I'm about to have to work 9 days straight, so it might be a few days on any progress, but... I'm going materials shopping tomorrow night and I'll go from there.

 

I've had the idea of rebuilding the 2 I have (1 is PRETTY bad, the other just has 3 cracks) has crossed my mind too, I just haven't pursued it.

I'll be interested in seeing what you come up with.

 

Someone Rhino-lined the dash in the 91 RS before I bought it.

Looked awful, and on those cold mornings it would hurt like crazy when I accidently raked my knuckles across it while driving.

So remeber this if someone comes up to you and says "You could just Rhino-line it!"....

 

I've thought about the Rhino Lining. Why did it look so bad? If they use minimal texture, I always thought it wouldn't look half bad.

 

Alright.. Day 1 progress (not much). I bought some flexible mesh-like fabric to go underneath the "new" vinyl. My thought was it will give the Vinyl a smoother appearance and hide the evidence of any cracks. I painted it just for the heck of it. Just a few pics along the way.... Lots more work to do!

Ignore the table/lawnmower in the pic.

Items used:
3M Automotive adhesive <-- Good stuff.. allows you to move the fabric around for a minute or so to get it right, but once it sets...its stuck on there.

Some sort of automotive mesh fabric stuff.. I'll get the name of it tomorrow. I don't recall at the moment.

I was still smoothing out the wrinkles when I took these..Those will be gone by the time I get ready to add vinyl.

 

i cant wait to see how this turns out, i have thought about maybe using fleece (sp?) with fiberglass resin then sanding it down, using bondo to get it smoother then painting it

 

i guess I'm alittle late to respond to this seeing how you had already started, but there is a company called Dash tops that makes a dash top cover to hide those hideous cracks. I'm not positive but I think their part number for it is 288. I can double check if need be. But I don;t think it is bad looking, it almost fooled me when I came across one

 

I google searched, but didn't find 3rd gen dash pads.

 

here is a link for them.

http://www.dashtops.com/dashboard/buydash.cfm/5279

 

Thanks. The pic is kinda hard to make out, but I don't see the speaker grilles. I bet they sell the same one, for ALL 82-92 3rd gens, when they aren't all the exact same in reality though.

I wish there was a better pic....


EDIT: They DO list a different one for the Pontiacs...1302. Even the pic is a little different, although the GTAs had a different one, than other Firebirds. I'm betting it is a standard Firebird dash, not quite like the GTA ones.

 

Fortunately, my dash pad is near-mint, but the one in my first car had cracks in it. I worked at a detail/upholstery shop at the time, & asked the upholstery guy what he'd do in that situation.

For something like $15, he put a little bit of adhesive in the cracks (to fill in the low parts) & then re-covered it with a vinyl material that matched the color of the car's interior. It wasn't perfect, but it looked better than it had before.

Not saying that's what everyone should do, just throwing it out there as one possible option...

 

I don't know much about Rhino lining, but it seemed way thicker than a normal dashpad.

And everytime I would scrape it with my fingers while making a turn or whatever, it would rather suck...especially in the winter before my heater got things warm.

 

i had a lot of cracks in mine, i just covered it with a thin layer of fleece that i got at wally world, that just helped even out all of the cracks. then i coverefd the fleece with a new layer of vinyl. it turned out really good.

 

I have had a thought of doing something similar, I have a dash cover, but it never quite stayed on well. I was thinking in just covering the whole dash in the "speaker box" carpet, (I don't mind the look of the dash pad) then cut out holes for the vents and perforate for the speakers.

 

was going to have mine covered in vinyl, there was a guy i worked with that did custom vinyl work, he showed me before and after pics on one he did on some other kind a car and it was sharp, he used a thin foam pad then covered it in vinyl.....but my boss made me fire him (i didnt want to and dont ask why he wanted him gone) so i dont see him anymore, but i think a soft padded vinyl dash would be cool, not sure if speaker sound would travel through it well....... i went with a dash mat for temp, still looking for a dash pad in good shape that someone dosent know the true value of it LOL

 

my car is an 84 and came with an absolutely perfect dash pad

 

lucky

 

why doesnt anybody make these out of fiberglass??

 

hey man before u cover that cut around that gashes and fill with bondo sand and cover it will come out with no imperfections

 

I coulda sworn that Unlimited Products made it, and other 'glass parts for our cars, but looking online, they aren't showing much. The might have stopped?

 

I took mine off, duct taped the cracks and then covered it with some black fuzzy material from a local fabric store. Used some spray adhesive and molded it to fit all the contours (it was kinda stretchy). After that I cut all the excess off with a razor blade. Looks good imo, doing more, will post pics.

 

I armor all mine every week and it looks just like new. I also keep it in the garage during the weekends and get the interior professionally cleaned and sealed about every two to three weeks.

I don't want to remove mine and have to fix it!!!