1959/1960 cadillac dash HELP

I have a 1960 cadillac coupe deville with a badly cracked dash. I am partial to metal dashes myself and am curious what the metal dash looks like under the padding . Does anyone have any pictures of a stripped dash? thanks for your help guys

 

No pics, sorry. This has been discussed before.

The metal dash is not pretty once stripped. It has a lot of "valleys" and is not smooth. It can be welded and filled/fiberglassed but, it is a huge amount of work. You'll also have to fill in the gauge pods, with the vinyl and foam pulled off, the gauges no longer fit snug. My suggstion would be to replace with a dash that came from the factory in bare metal, such as that from a '59 Impala or buy the cheapie plastic overlay, but stripping your dash to bare metal is not worth the effort. A redone dash from places like Just Dashes is very expensive, and also not worth it unless your doing a #1 restoration.

 

No pics, but it looks like shit. I had a '59 awhile back and the previous owner had made the decision to remove the padding and bedliner the dash the same color as interior. (Two wrongs don't make a right). You'll lose the two protrusions on the sides of the instrument cluster, made out of cardboard covered with foam and plastic. I guess you could make it look right as bare metal with alot of fab work. I'd just buy a dash cap for it, they're inexpensive ~ $150.00.

 

Thanks guys, I saw a thread last night on putting in a 59 impala dash....I really like that. Since they are both are both 59-60 big body chevys I assume it will fit in realitively easy???

 

I personally hate the padded dashes myself. I recently took my 60 cadillac dash and got it fiberglassed. I saw what the metal looked like. I will try and find the pics I took while it was in procees to show you.

 

Never done it, but I can't imagine it would be that difficult. That would look tits though, the Impala had a killer dash.

 

that'd be awesome, thanks.

I just found a 59 impala dash, complete with all gauges locally for $250. I'm going to go pick it up and paint it to match before I start pulling mine out. I may restore mine and hold onto it in case I sell the car or just put it up on ebay.

 

YEP, not pretty at all !
60'

 

Last I heard, Just Dashes http://www.justdashes.com/ re-dos were like $600 - $700 or something like that. Bare metal the dashes look like something someone crudely hammered out - I've seen them up close. I've even seen them in an article by Just Dashes many years ago.

The Fiberglass idea is awesome, actually. I bet if a guy took the dash pad off, stripped it, and got friendly with gorilla hair, bondo, sandpaper and a high-pile primer it might look pretty good!

~Jason

 

Impala dashes are welded in, so make sure they cut it out properly, either by drilling out the spot welds or cutting on the body side of the welds. The swap will work, but I'm saying it's going to be a fair amount of work. There is 0 chance that you'll be able to do it without cutting the windshield out, and that can be a can of worms in itself.

 

I have a 60 cadillac convertible. 59 and 60 cadillac/impalas (and a few others) share many parts. the windshield and frame one one of the similarities.

 

The guy I am buying the dash from is a impala nut... He's going to take the dash out and go through the gauges for me.

 

If its not to bad 3m makes a great filler that feathers great! Just did my 60!

 

yeah....my dash is pretty bad.

 

Does anyone have a picture of a dash cap installed? I might buy one myself if I could see what it looks like beforehand.

 

There's a pink '59 Cadillac 4-door in Independence, MO on eBay right now that has close-ups of a shitty dash cap install.

~Jason

 

I'd like to have my 60 dash fiberglassed , about how much was it ?

 

You may wanna ask someone else, he hasn't been on here for 6 1/2 years!