has anyone here installed or have pictures of a dash cap installed on a 59 caddy. does anyone have any feedback on these things at all. i have no covering or padding left on my metal dash frame. and my first qoute was quite expensive. this is a solid car but i dont plan doing a resto just clean up the interior nice. and keep it on the road. but i dont want to bother with a piece o-$$$t cover either. i cant find any installed pics on the net any feedback would be great . Thanks john
Check with McVey's or USA parts, I think they have plastic caps that can be upholstered...but there's no way around getting one upholstered, I don't think anyone makes a repro already done. R-
you may be better off tring to find one, apposed to rebuilding yours. good luck either way cadillacs are awesome, but when you need a part like this, you really take it in the ***. try gar at a & a auto in brentwood i believe. he'll probly have one, but like i said you'll be paying for it.
as far as i can tell the plastic caps sold on ebay slip over the existing dash and thats it. but i was concerned how bad they might fit.
The padded dash on my 55 Olds was deteriorated beyond recognition. My upholstery guy made a sewn cover for it, but used thin "vinyll top" padding, glued to the dash, under the cover. Looks great, and you wouldn't know the difference!
Yes if Made in Sweden its good for you. If I remember so makes this to Buick, Cad, Fors Mopar. I dont find thers web but go and ask here www.gasolinemagazine.se or www.wheelsmagazine.se the last I know this company have notice in some time Hopes you can find this Anders
The dash caps you're referring to do the job but they are "short" around the instrument cluster, meaning the cap doesn't extend back the cluster. However, they do the job and are a quick fix. They're usually installed over the old dash material and would probably not fit right over the bare metal dash, never tried it? It will be fairly obvious that you have a dash cap, meaning you won't fool anyone, but again it looks better than a cracked up faded dash. Another option is having your dash re-done. One company that does this is Just Dashes in Van Nuys, CA. The finished product is a better than new original looking dash. Last time I checked it was around $2000 to have the dash and two end pieces re-done. Another option is having your dash upholstered in vinyl/ leather. They always end up with seams on the dash due to the complexity of the dash but I have seen some very nice dashes done this way that showed very well. The thing with this approach is most shops don't want to do it. You need to track down a shop that's willing to do it and can actually do it right. Finally, I have seen Cadillac dashes done in fibergl***, meaning you strip it to bare metal and build it up with fibergl***, similar to what the audio shops do for custom speaker enclosures. I had a buddy do one recently that turned out gorgeous. It had a flake job done on it and he had a ton of hours into it. It was installed in the car and about a week later it cracked right down the middle, so beware. Bottom line is, it all depends on what it is you're trying to do with the car, from what I read in your post, it seems that the cap may be a good way to go
This is what I would do...I've done it in the past on a pair of weird O/T builds (read: a Russian and Fench cars) and they came out quite well....so much so that it made the rest of the interior look like ****... only bout 50 bucks for the materials (for the pair) but gobs of time...
i am doign the same thing to my 60 flattop. under teh cushon when you tear it apart is just regular foam. what i am going to do is go to the vinyl store get, get some marne vinyl like the kind for boats and stretch and glue. i choose marine vinyl becuase it is meant for being out in the sun : just like the under side of windshiled. the guys are correct in that around the gauge cluster will be tough because the petruding clock and cadillac emblem, but it will just take small time. you could get a realy big piece if vinyl and strectch it over teh entire thing then cut and trim. but a good looking two tone would be much cheaper i think. here was mines
here is a link to a guy showing how he does it if this helps http://ucuap.com/1959CadillacDashboard.html
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