Another dash panel refresh

[isaac]

Plastic dash parts were looking ratty and cracked….. couldn’t take it any more! Removed the trim and gauges, repaired and painted the plastic, put back together, and much to my relief (and surprise) it all works again. The magic trick for me was making “ABS slurry” from acetone and bits of ABS plastic. Worked very well for crack repair and hole filling. A bit of sanding and spray paint finished the job. Replaced the switches, made new ignition switch panel and stereo blanking panel. Two weeks start to finish.

[jtryon]

nice refresh on the switches too, are those new wire marine? i did the same ones this season.

[isaac]

Thanks. Yes, the switches are through Rocker Switch Pros, a part of New Wire Marine. Struck me as exceptionally fast and reasonable service.

[waking53]

Hi Isaac,
We are about to pull the dash and rocker switch panel to repair several spider cracks around the larger guages and a couple of rocker switches.

Just curious how you addressed identifying the lead/guage connections. We are looking to purchase color coded vinyl/adhesive labels to identify and re-match connection. Maybe you have some tips that you may share on how you successfully addressing the disconnecting wire spaghetti we have behind the panels.

[isaac]

The spaghetti is really terrible on these boats. I took lots of pictures and used my label maker to mark the wires. Zip tied per-gauge bundles to keep it all straight. I also have a schematic from Tige which helped.

i fortified plastic cracks and weak areas on the backside of the plastic panel with a slurry made from acetone and ABS plastic. Found the technique online…worked well. I tried filling some frontside spider cracks with bondo glazing compound. Looked perfectly smooth under paint for a couple of months then it shrank or something. Doesn’t look good now

[Vettedrmr]

That's important info to know (if not what you wanted); thanks for sharing the good and bad. I wonder if a vinyl wrap business could do a film on the panel surface, and would/could that work better than paint?

Have a good one,
Mike

[isaac]

I think if I were to try again, I’d either use normal bondo filler without trying to use the bondo glazing compound. Or I’d make a fiberglass replacement part. I’m kinda leaning toward the fiberglass but haven’t been in the mood to pull the gauges again.

ive gotten two summers on the initial refresh. The abs slurry repair of the cracks and weak spots has worked perfectly. But the Bondo glaze / spot putty looks bad now. It really did look perfect when I did it. I let it sit for a week or so between the glaze and paint.

its the first time I ever tried bondo glaze / spot putty, and I’m certainly no car body repairman. So I probably screwed something up (but don’t know what).