Early
on I made some cardboard mock ups of possible dash designs. But I was never
happy with them really.
The
wires were pretty much sorted by this stage. The digi display was held in
with Duct tape. I decided to get on with a centre switch console. I had to
break the indecision, so I thought "functional. Just get on with it".
I decided that 4mm Plywood was light and cheap and therefore would make a good material. At this stage I was thinking about trimming it with some Black trimming material. Whatever.
I
bought some Aluminium strip from B&Q (expensive mind, it would have been
better to find a proper stockists). I made up some cardboard templates in
the car. I used these to mark out the plywood.
I
used some 8mm square timber to stiffen up the plywood. Once I had both sides
done I clamped them together and planed the edges so that they were
identical.
The Aluminium brackets were screwed to the heater housing. The panels were fixed to the brackets with cap head screws.
I
bought a load of toggle switches at my local Maplins.
The
warning lights were replaced with 3mm LEDs, also from Maplins. I kept the
original hazard warning switch. This fitted into a carefully filed hole.
After
four months of Duct tape I finally bolted the digi display down. I used
pieces of Aluminium extrusion from B&Q to make supports. I used self tapping
screws to hold the frame to the dash unit.
After
a while I became so bored with switches hanging on a piece of wood that I
got on with a second attempt at a console. Firstly I bent up some thin Ally
sheet from B&Q. This was way too flimsy so I got my local sheet metal place
(Glevum Sheet Metal) to make a replica in 3mm Ally. This was still too
rattley, so I stiffened it up with some Ally bar from B&Q. I drilled and
filed a load of holes in it for the check control warning LEDs, light
switches, hazard switch and the central locking lock/unlock push buttons.
With the LEDs it was necessary to put a 500Ohm resistor into the common wire
to limit the current down to their 20mA current rating.
