I was planning on just cleaning/painting my cowl area. Once I got in there, I ended up removing the hood and then the windshield :eek: I have some rust to fix, but what is the area of the dash made of (where the defrost vents and the speaker grill are)? Is that metal with sone kind of coating or is it metal with plastic over it? What's the best way to paint/protect this area? I plan on using POR15 with Chasis Coat black around the window channel and cowl area, but wasn't sure about this other area.

HOLY COWL! (http://www.erols.com/ruther/69conv/enginedetail/b4_noglasspass.jpg)

HOLY COWL Passenger Side! (http://www.erols.com/ruther/69conv/enginedetail/b4_cowlpass.jpg)


Here's a link to yesterdays work, just more than I anticipated...I have new belts, hoses, hood seals, etc. Should be fun.

More than I can chew? (http://www.erols.com/ruther/69conv/enginedetail)

:eek: graemlins/sad.gif :eek: graemlins/sad.gif

Ouch. That really sucks, Jerry, but it was not going to fix itself, and would only get worse, so you're doing the right thing.

The dash is just painted sheet metal. It was a special type of textured paint that has been discussed at length here before (perhaps not in this forum, but on TC). It was done to reduce glare off the top of the dashboard. I think it's generally agreed that the finish is not easily replicated, but you can come close. I did it on my old yellow convert with rattle cans. I painted it all (cowl and the top of the dash) with semi-gloss black. Then I masked off the cowl and just shot on a very light, 'dry' coat of flat black. I held the can back about 24" - 30" from the surface to do this. You won't get the original texture, but the appearance will be similar. Good luck.

Thanks for the reply Bill. I guess I will grind/sand/fill the rusted areas as best as possible, then apply the POR15 and Chasis Coat Black to those areas and the cowl. Then, for dash area, I'll just shoot it with a flat black...

Thanks for the help.


JR

Jerry,

What's really a shame is that 95% of your dash looks great. Don't know if it would be practical or feasible, but if you're not going to do any welding of metal up in that area, you might be able to mask off the majority of your dash that's in good shape and just repair/refinish the rusted area. That way most of your dash would retain the original texture and finish, and only the part right down near the base of the windshield would look different. On my old car, I had to paint the whole dash because some previous knucklehead thought it would be a good idea to paint it gloss black graemlins/angry.gif

I redid mine. It looked almost as bad as yours. I welded in pieces, ground it smooth as possible, put on a skim coat of filler, primed. Then for a topcoat I used Rustoleum Bar-B-Que paint. Its texture looks factory and 'so far' hasn't faded. Been a year, but not a daily driver. Be SURE you remove all the insulation, etc inside before welding. I have a welding blanket that I shoved up under the dash before I started. Oh, and I did put the 'rust encapsulation' paint around the channel and under the dash.