Motors Custom Dashboards: Is it possible?

Okay, while I've decided to have a mechanic take care of the... uhm.. mechanical parts of the car, I've thought it might be cool to make a custom dashboard for my car.

It must serve 3 purposes:

1. Display car information in an intuitive manner (fuel levels, engine temp, and possibly speed if that's possible)
2. Allow me to change radio stations or switch to an auxiliary audio input. (I honestly don't want to put a CD player in, those just get stolen anyway.)
3. Look cool and get me all the ladies. And by "all the ladies" I mean my wife. And by "get" I mean impress... so I guess I should have just said "impress my wife"... and looking geeky yet classy might be nice too.

Here's the long-term goal of the car:
Look nicer, implement new technologies cheaply, and be less break-in-able. Oh, and be drivable so I can get to work.

I plan on having the dash replaced within the next year or two, so I'm not asking if this can be done in a weekend, just asking if it can be done, or if there is magic stored in the dash that keeps the car running.

If this is possible, I'll start throwing some drawings up and getting ideas.

It'll be good to do anyway since the temperature and fuel gauges don't really work so much as just sit there displaying the entirely wrong data.


Edit: through the magic of Google I learned I probably have a faulty voltage limiter, but I'll ignore that and say I need to tear apart the dash irreparably anyway so I still have an excuse to make a new dash.

Remember, the goal is not functionality, duct tape holding the gauges up is functional, we want it to look cool, yet not overly shiny.

 

Brushed alu (to reduce glare but look cool), LED strips for levels etc.

 

HUD! You need a good HUD!

 

Look at the new Honda Civic. Learn.

 

http://www.autotap.com/product_family.asp?FamilyId=260

 

what's kind of car is it?

 

Unless youve got exprance with advanced electroinics good luck youll need it.

 

make and model.

 

Definately need a make and model and what the current interior looks like!

My dashboard is made from mdf, covered in black leather vinyl, brushed alu around the dials and 10cm speakers at either end.

 

It's definitely possible. I can't find the link now but someone did it to his FRP. He just had a widescreen LCD which fitted into the original dash space running some software on a Mini-ITX PC.

I'll see if I can dig out the project log.

Yuck - the dashboard in that thing looks awful!! Looks almost as bad as some of the Citroens!

 

I'm not neccessarily talking about custom instrumentation (yet), just something that looks nice.

It is a '95 Buick Century (so we're not talking some fancy car here, in fact AutoTap starts in '96 ).

I basically want to take an old family car and turn it into a nice geeky sportscar on the inside but keep the outside fairly old-school. (I'm only planning a black paint job on the outside... possibly silver depending on the cost and long-term durability of the paints.)

 

I like the new civic interiors, but I'll definitely be doing something different than that (just to be a bit more unique). I will try and draw some stuff up over the next few days and see how they fit with the car.

I guess I should take measurements first to see how much space I've got to work with, because I know it isn't a ton of space.

Stickeh, did you make a custom dash, or is that just what your dash happened to be made of?

I was actually thinking of something similar, a lightweight MDF frame with vinyl stretched across, kind of like a fancy speaker box or something. I Just want to get a few of the "natural curves" by stretching it across a few points sticking out, then I'll have to find some way to add support to the inside after-the-fact.

 

can be done

inside the dash you'll find a lovely plethora of wires

key features typically hidden inside dash:

auxillary fuse panel (fuses for stuff like dash lights, headlights, radio, typically serviced or replaced fuses)

car's ecu

climate control relays, blowers, all associated vents

stereo & associated wiring

ignition harness

steering column

gauge cluster wiring

associated support framing for all that stuff

and if you've got power door locks/windows etc, most of the time, the relays for that are behind the dash as well

typically you'll find people who want to drag race/track race/autox their cars, will rip out the dash down to only the required wiring, and hook in custom gauges on their cars to some sort of piece of metal

if you're planning on retaining stock interior, it makes it slightly different, but is still easy to do


with a buick like that, i would assume automatic with shifter on column, might make things a bit more difficult, but not too much

also, tbh, i find the new civic dashes slight obnoxious (though less so than new minis)

best setup to me, is to have speedo/tach centered in front of wheel, fuel/temp/voltage gauges to the right side, and boost/afr/oil press gauges to the left on the pillar (but that's because most of my cars run some sort of forced induction)

 

Cool, thanks for the tips. I'll look through the Chilton manual to see what to expect before I go digging things out.

Unfortunately I'll probably have to remove the dash at least once before even coming up with a real plan, because my guess is the position of various car frame elements as well as device lengths (such as steering columns and whatnot) will determine where my supports need to be and how much room I have to play with.

I don't mind extending a few wires for things like the stereo, but then again all I really need for the stereo is an FM tuner, small amp, an input, and some radio/volume/eq knobs. (90% of my stereo usage comes from my iPod anyway, I only listen to the radio for the morning show at m88.org which broadcasts in my area)

I don't, however, want to extend every single wire just to bring everything a few inches closer to me.

 

if you're planning on doing it the way the speaker enclosure boys do it you'll need an mdf frame and some form of "fleece" or stretchy carpet and a bucket load of fibreglass resin and hardener to give it some rigidity. Either that or use your old dash (or a spare) as a template, its totally possible to remove large pieces of dash and then custom fabricate replacement panels and it also keeps all the stock mounting points for when you bolt it back in which makes life easier.

I've done it a few times in the course of my job as we do a fair bit of fabrication for custom stereo installs and thats how we'd go about it at work.

 

I made it from MDF. Luckily for me i only had to worry about my speedo dial wiring, as thats all the car had before i started! I did install a new stereo but that was a new wiring job and wasnt hard, i also didnt have an air conditioning system ( hell its 17 years old, it just had VENTs and tubing from the car wings for 'cold air' and even these holes were plated up as its a prime rust spot!)
Heres some before shots:


And some after shots:



Note the door cards also in the same leather
Oh and the dash is different now, it has three clocks, now i have a rev counter and they are surrounded by a brushed aluminium plate
(oh and the bike lock round the steering wheel is my ghetto car safety device!)

 

honestly, a haynes or helms manual is about 500x more useful (helms being the manual used by techs, and haynes being better than chiltons), though it's worth while to own all 3

 

Thanks again for all the tips.

I will probably wind up using fiberglass resin, depending on the cost, but my thought was actually to build the bones of the frame, stretch the material around it, then start screwing in wooden sheets behind the vinyl with padding in the right places to help it keep its form without being too hallow... (possibly foam cut to shape, if I could find some cheap enough.)

At that point I'd probably have spent enough money to just get some fiberglass resin, huh?

 

try to see if you can use the stock metal structure, and just cast or form a resin shape to fit it, that simplifies the process significantly

 

Learn what NOT to do? LOL

Technically impressive, but man is that ugly!

Each to their own tho.

Anyhooo.... Sounds like it's the sort of project that can easily end up being more than the car is actually worth.