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Sat Feb 14, 2004 2:57 pm

My 69 has a veneer dashboard and I decided to peel it off and paint it the color of the car. The material behind the veneer/wood apears to be made of something else other than metal. I think it's wood, because I looked at the radio section since the radio had been pulled out and it really looks like wood.

Is this right?

Mon Feb 16, 2004 8:39 am

well, I am not sure what the original verneer was made of as my Ghia was stripped down and painted the original color, BUT I do know you can get actual wood verneers that are pliable enough to put on a dashboard given enough glue. Who know how many layers of stuff has been stuck on there, I've seen people use contact paper for their fake wood dash (ew!!).
How does the exposed layer look? Can you sand it?

Tue Feb 17, 2004 4:52 pm

Thanks for the info. After carefully looking at the dash from the trunk, it appears the PO did some fiberglassing to the radio area to accomodate an aftermarket radio. It is just a small section that did not appear to be metal. My delimma now is how do I get that area ready for paint, since I really want the painted dash for the 68.

Tue Feb 17, 2004 5:34 pm

badadebe wrote: Thanks for the info. After carefully looking at the dash from the trunk, it appears the PO did some fiberglassing to the radio area to accomodate an aftermarket radio. It is just a small section that did not appear to be metal. My delimma now is how do I get that area ready for paint, since I really want the painted dash for the 68.

The proper way is to carefully weld metal back into the opening till it is back to the original size and shape. Expensive if you can't do it yourself, and you'll have to fill, sand and smooth it, but anything else I doubt that you'll be happy with. Try searching in the split bus forum-- someone posted a link to a webste that shows a bus dashboard being fixed correctly a few months ago.