Has anyone ever done this? My stock dash is gray I want to wrap it in black. I was thinking leather maybe vynal

Close, I did the back part to cover over the cracks in mine.

Its not too hard.

how hard was itt o get the vinal all the way to the front of the peice? or did you pull the dash to do this

Z24BaLler wrote:how hard was itt o get the vinal all the way to the front of the peice? or did you pull the dash to do this

I can't imagine doing it without pulling the dash.



- Interior FAQ -
J-Body of Michigan -

How do u get that piece out? The piece closest to the windshield, just recently I noticed some cracks in mine

directly from the FAQ:

ii) Dash trim closest to window: On Sunfires, this portion just pops out. On Cavaliers this is rather difficult (here's why) - I hope you're up for a long task. Follow the directions at Team Forward Motion to remove the front dash pad and the radio/HVAC trim. Once you've got that done, your steering wheel needs to be pulled. See directions in question 17. What else? Passenger-side airbag has to go. All of the HVAC piping needs to be removed. The HVAC controls, radio, gauge cluster, steering wheel trim, windshield washer/blinker arms all need to be removed. As everything is coming off, you'll note that that one little trim piece is part of the entire dash. Remove the brass bolts and the entire assembly can be pulled out of the car.





- Interior FAQ -
J-Body of Michigan -

Leave it to General to make this an insurmountable task to replace a stupid piece of cheap plastic trim. I just cracked mine the last time I took the dash off to hardwire the MP3 player to the head unit. I've had it apart a dozen times before, and this time it finally cracks. After reading this post, it's probably gonna stay that way too.





Gotta keep on livin', L-I-V-I-N

wrapping the dash top is easy. ive done mine with 4 different fabrics. mine is currently black vinyl.

instead of using 3m spray adhesive or anything like that, thru all my wrapping experience, ive found that contact cement works best IMO. then i seal all the edges with hot glue.

Eazy, did you have to pull everything out to wrap it, or were you able to tuck the front edge? The crack is bothering me cuz I know it's my fault, but I don't want to have to remove the entire dashboard to get to the piece.




Gotta keep on livin', L-I-V-I-N

If you want a professional looking wrap on that cracked piece, you're going to have to pull out the entire dash.

As Joey said, wrapping the dash top itself is easy.



- Interior FAQ -
J-Body of Michigan -

sorry, i was referring to the actual dash pad, not the piece near the window as shown above. i thought thats what the original question was asking.

as far as wrapping the front piece, i would say you should pull the whole dash out, or at bare minimum, loosen all the bolts and pull it forward some to gain clearance to tuck it. but i myself would pull the whole piece

bone stock z wrote:Leave it to General to make this an insurmountable task to replace a stupid piece of cheap plastic trim. I just cracked mine the last time I took the dash off to hardwire the MP3 player to the head unit. I've had it apart a dozen times before, and this time it finally cracks. After reading this post, it's probably gonna stay that way too.

same here lol If it wasn't for messin with the steering wheel, I'd go for it, but when I change wheels I'll venture to fix the crack.

Wasn't somebody marketing a "cap" of some sort for this problem. What a crappy design for sure! Any other ideas to cover this creatively besides ripping the stupid dash apart?

I pulled the whole dash out to recover it, mainly because I had so many cracks I had to glue it all back together before I could recover it. I think you could get by with just loosening the bolts but by the time you do that your half way there and might as well take it all the way out.

Its not too hard to get out, the biggest problem is that most people don't have a steering wheel puller but most auto parts stores will lend you one. If you have all the tools and everything you need to recover it I think it could all be done in around 4 or 5 hours. I broke mine up and did it over a couple of nights, spending about 2 hours a night.

Quote:

contact cement

I'll have to try that next time I do something like this. I used the 3M spray and got decent results.

I've got some more pics of the whole process on my cardomain page.
Recover Dash

thanks for the help guys, I'll let you know what happens.