On the bottom of the instrument bezel where the heater controls are is it supposed to be chrome or paint? Same with the radio bezel. Thanks Matt
Matt, Silver in the large area with a small chrome 'strip' around the area. When I get home tonight I will post a pic of both the radio surround and the lower dash area.
thanks george i would like to see that, i was thinking of having the entire silver part chrome since they will have to chrome the entire thing anyway. Any recommendations on who can restore the chrome? matt
I got this write up almost two years ago from a fellow board member who restored his 69 dash, so I thought I would share it with you, you may find it helpful. He will probably chime in and give his identity away once he reads it. :laugh: Hi Chris I did infact restore mine several years ago.....It wasn't fun, It wasn't easy....and it wasn't cheap !! If i were you, I'd look for a good used one and replace yours unless your a masochist then again....I dont think I've ever seen a GOOD used one. In fact, I've said several times to myself - "Self - Go rip the beautiful original one out of that Skylark you have and put it in your worthy GS !!" Here's what i did.... I took a near mint radio bezel (same color - think its called Argent) to an auto paint supply house. They have a handheld scanner that "reads" the color and then tells them what magic potion to brew up to get that color. I bought the smallest amount possible, 1 pint i think, and it was like $30 and enough to paint every surviving dash bezel (unfortunately it wasn't stored properly and went bad or else I'd send you some ). I also brought the dash bezel in for them to match the black - its a no-gloss (flat) black that they didn't have to special mix. Also needed were both a plastic cleaner and plastic prep - again smallest quantity sold was enought to do a fleet of dashes. All told It was around $100. That, my friend, was the EASY part !!! What was the difficult part was masking all of the fine chrome lines that are around the bezel that took about 3 nites and a pack of single sided razor blades and a roll of masking tape. If i remember correctly, I masked everything but the Argent and used a friends detail air brush to spray that - several light coats. Then I unmasked the black and covered the Argent, and sprayed that. Id seriously suggest practicing with the airbrush if you've never used one before....on something other than your bezel but something of similar property. When the paint was dry, I used an artists detail pen - chrome color fine tip, to go over the fine line. Initially i was just going to "touch up" the bad spots but it didn't look right so i went over it all. Soooo......how's it look ??? Very presentable, but not correct. The Argent color came out alittle more silver-y than it should be but Im being picky. It looks better than most dashes and even my Argent color looks better than some other painted ones I've seen where the person just used a silverish color. As Paul Harvey says....."And Now you know the Rest of the Story" __________________
Thanks guys, i thought thats what it was supposed to look like. The last person to attempt to restore it painted all the chrome silver so it looks like i will have to have it re-chromed. Since they have to chrome the entire piece i thought it would look cool if the silver paint part was all chrome. Been talking with Mr G's ever deal with them? Matt
I sent a dash bezel to Mr G's and they made three attempts to get it right and never did. If your not picky about the quality and have a few months to spare along with enough money to keep paying to ship it back to them they may eventually get it right. Rick
not what i wanted to hear, how did the chrome look? I was going to have them do the chrome and paint it myself MAtt
most of it isn't supposed to be chrome, it is supposed to be argent. They came from the factory painted, not chromed like the 70's.
It looks like Chrome but it is not really chrome. The finish is very delicate and requires special materials and technique to mask, so if your going to paint it yourself I would be very careful. Also if you send it out to anyone and you want yours done you better specify that in the instructions to the vendor. I didn't realize that when I sent my good core out and got a glued one back. They did a good job in glueing the tabs on and that was not the problem. They painted it some oddball custom colors the first time and also with unacceptable chrome like plating and the last time they did it they oversprayed the plating, touched up a place they missed with possibly a Q-Tip when they airbrushed the silver and there were areas where they didn't mask correctly. Maybe someone else had a better experience with Them, but not me. Rick
Dash Bezel To All, I have been reading the posts about paint. Would 'aluminum' paint look close to 'argent'? Just wondering if anyone has tried that? Gil
