Materials for Instrument Panel

[Halcyon Daze]

I'm suffering a major parting of ways of veneer and metal on my instrument panel which may just allow me to see the summer out before it completely separates. This has caused me to wonder, this and the frequent tinking of the dash and instruments as the car heats up, has anyone experimented with different materials for the instrument dash and heater panel frames ? I'm aware of the numerous options for the veneer.

It strikes me that any wood veneer is on a hiding to nothing sat on a metal frame in a car that heats up so much, has anyone tried something less prone to expansion and contraction, for example engineered wood ? Or is that it needs to be metal for some reason I haven't yet grasped.

Cheers

Andy.

[GJR]

Hi Andy,

I'm going to be doing this myself at some point in the next few months. I've done a bit of searching and found a site that might help, I'll add the link once I've found it again..

I'm guessing now but I imagine that the original veneer was laid directly on metal for ease of manufacture, plus you'd need sturdy back plate to support the weight of the instruments without flexing.

One thing you can do which I think it shows in the link.. is to glue a piece of thin plywood (~1 - 1.5mm) to the metal plate to take the initial heat contact. The veneer is then glued on the ply.. so you have a metal/ply/veneer sandwich. The bonding of veneer to ply should also help stop the lifting and bubbling of the veneer as I'm sure the wood to wood bond would be stronger than wood to metal....

http://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&a...

http://www.streaky-bacon.co.uk/Wedge/reveneering.h...

G