Tahoe Z71 renovation project - Cracked Dash Fix

[The Raven]

Well I know this has been covered extensively so i'm not going to dwell on the repair technique when there's plenty of data on thats already out there...but I know that when going into a project like this there can never be too many examples of how other guys did it. So here's mine...I went a bit further than the average.

Background - I almost traded my NNBS Tahoe Z71 in back in February because I had a ton of GM card points to use and the Tahoe needed some TLC. Unfortunately i'm not a big fan of the new Tahoes nor spending near $70k for one and I just wasn't happy with anything smaller. Got real close to a deal on a new LT Trail Boss but I backed out because i've never been a big fan of pickups. So i've decided i'm going to invest some money into the Tahoe and hold onto it for at least another 3 years. I have been busy with all kinds of "renovations" this year and i'll get those upgrades posted soon.

So after lots of work, both "fixes" and upgrades, I finally pushed myself to tackle the dash cracks.

My befores:



The cracks after I got the dash out:

 

[The Raven]

The repair:



My defroster vent panel had lost all but one of it's attachment points only the far right trim clip peg remained. You might have thought the only choice was to replace it, but that's a $300+ part so screw that noise, i decided to fix it:




I used 3/16" abs stock and cut new pegs, hot stapled them in place then smothered them in epoxy. Sorry I don't have any more pics of this but it worked perfectly. I was able to replace all the pegs and re-attach all the front slide-in clamp thingys.

 

[The Raven]

and then finally, because I have tried to repair my behind-the-cluster crack with glue for years, there was no way to make it look good from the top, I decided to (fake) leather-wrap the whole deal:

 

[The Raven]

All finished and installed:



It's red because that's going to be the new color scheme...new matching leather for the seats is on order and i'm going to do the same color in the door inserts. The red SRT interior in the Durango was my inspiration. I'm a sucker for red and black.

So there you have it. My approach to the dash crack issue. Hopefully this will serve as inspiration for some of you still unsure about what to do with your cracks.

 

[Keanen55]

I thought about wrapping mine too, but got lazy and went with Dash skins route! Nice work! Looks great!

 

[The Raven]

I thought about wrapping mine too, but got lazy and went with Dash skins route! Nice work! Looks great!

You saved yourself a ton of time and frustration. Wrapping a dash is no joke...it sucks. If you do it right though, the results are incredible.

 

[Joseph Garcia]

Great job!!

 

[BourbonNcigars]

I'm impressed. Well done. No way I'd have tried this. That looks like WAY more work than I'd be willing to put in. When I had my Tahoe I threw some of that premium $30 **** on top of the dash.

 

[Tonyrodz]

All finished and installed:

View attachment 229980 View attachment 229981 View attachment 229982 View attachment 229983

It's red because that's going to be the new color scheme...new matching leather for the seats is on order and i'm going to do the same color in the door inserts. The red SRT interior in the Durango was my inspiration. I'm a sucker for red and black.

So there you have it. My approach to the dash crack issue. Hopefully this will serve as inspiration for some of you still unsure about what to do with your cracks.

Looks great. I wonder how it'll look after a summer in the sun tho.

 

[08HoeCD]

Looks great!

I just discovered today that I have a small crack in my dash. It took 161k miles for it to finally rear its ugly head. I couldn't care less at this point.