When I bought my 73 three years ago one of the selling points was that there were no cracks in the dashboard. I've taken good care of it - it's cool here in Flagstaff - and I regularly use windshield sun-screens, but despite this I noticed this week that I've gotten a crack in the dashboard.

Is there anything I can squeeze into it to make it cosmetically better and maybe even keep it from getting larger or longer? I thought of using some black RTV, but I don't know of anything else that would be a candidate and I don't know whether it would really work at all.

Any ideas?

33 year old dashes dont last forever.

Mine has one crack rearing its head... but its such a nice dash!!

Nothing you can do about it AFAIK

Here in the Tampa Bay area there's a company called Vinyl Doctor that supposedly can fix minor vinyl cracks. I haven't had one done, yet, but you might try to find something similar in your area.

-- Rob

What Rob said! It's a franchise, so they're everywhere. I had them do the dash in my 67, and it came out great! Fairly cheap, too.

303 Protectant is good stuff. It will not fix the crack that has already started but it might help you from getting any more. I can't find in anywhere locally, so I get mine on eBay.

Thanks guys! Vinyl Doctor turns out to be something associated with replacement windows for your house, but Dr. Vinyl (at http://www.drvinyl.com/index2.html) seems to be the one. They have a franchise in Scottsdale where my daughter lives so I think I'll have to make a trip to see my grandkids one of these days :-) and get my dash fixed at the same time!

Now if I can only get my wife to ride along in the 914 for that long...

John,

I think you can find it at West Marine on Lake Mead BLVD in Henderson. Give them a buzz and find out. The owner's name is Tony and is a damn nice guy.

I looked at dash toppers when I first got my car...ordered one from Performance Products. I was disappointed in the effect and so I sent it back, bought a replacement dash top and put it in myself, without taking out the windshield. It was a stone bitch to do. In fact, I got so frustrated the first day that I had to stop and continue the next. I eventually got it though and, since then, I have a black dash mat that covers it most of the time (it looks like a fine texture floor mat that is custom fitted to match the instrument binnacle and the ashtray. I don't know what the availability of dash tops are any more (this was in about 1988) but it was not cheap then. I can only imagine that now the cost probably approaches that a full tank of gas . Unless the crack is very minor, I don't see how the repair will be invisible.

Camping World has it too. I think it's great, although I'm sure it works much better if you actually apply it as opposed to letting it sit in the bottle in the garage like I do.

Just buy a new dash. $600 every 30 years isn't too much of a price to pay.