KIt Car Dashboard - Burr Walnut Veneer Project

[Gadgetman]

I am very new to the site but I joined to enhance my woodworking knowledge ...... so here goes

I have a kit car and I was thinking of replacing the dashboard with a Burr Walnut Veneered one. Never done anything like this before. I have a plywood template but wondered if anyne has any tips before I attempt a project like this.

Thanks for any help


................

WOW ...... glad I joined. I didn't expect this much traffic so early.

The dashboard is flat but i wondered about putting a radius at the bottom to avoid putting veneer at right angles to the face. Sounds like that may be a step too far. I like the sound of the board SteveF bought at an auction but would like to do it the hard way. I do live in England so waterproof is essential but heat proof less so. I don't have a vacuum press...... yet

I will have a look at Youtube posts and consider all suggestions. One thing I did consider was making the board flat and cutting the holes with a dremel once veneered. Think I will only make the one!

Thanks for the advice

 

[Ttrees]

Sounds most challenging ...
Take a piccy or two of the dash in question, thats a given...
Have you got the burr walnut ?
Leaving allowance for errors
Can you take this dashboard into the workshop with you ? ...will it distort if you do ?

A vacuum press would probably be the best way of going about this ....but then you need to make it.
Do you plan on doing another dash after this ?
Do you plan on doing it again if it does not turn out the way you envision ?
You could make shaped cauls to clamp the veneer either....

Do you plan on doing seamless joints, or is there divided sections that will make this easier.

If it were me I'd be researching veneering, hammer veneering , hide glue suitability .
It would need to be warm to glue these veneers with hide and you would need to be fast!
I have always meant to do a youtube veneering marathon, but never got round .
The only names I know is Steve Latta and Paul Schurch who have done videos on the subject.

I suggest if you have your veneers allready keep them in the same place.
I don't think you would have anything to loose by trying making up thick paper templates to try and fit
the pieces to the shape you want ....
Although you might not know what veneer size sheets you have ,but it might be a start ?
Be aware that both the wood and the paper will expand and contract ...so don't go cutting things and expecting them to be perfect, where they were last week .
Learn to have sharp tools ...if you can't shave the hair on your arm with NO effort, with ONE swipe ...not taking skin dust ...not having to try and take a second swipe to shave ...this is the kind of sharp you probably need for that difficult stuff.
I made a tutorial on making yer own cabinet scraper for cheap ...this may be of some use .

Cant wait for others to pitch in ...it will be an interesting post ...
I will certainly learn from it ...
Good luck with your endevour
Tom

 

[gasman]

I've done a few of these before for mates.
It was very straightforward. I just used PVA glue and weighted the dashboards down (they were flat) until the glue dried. After cleaning them I used a rustins 2 part finish which gave a mirror finish to them. I guess if its a curved 3 dimensional surface it would be much trickier
Cheers
Mark

 

[SteveF]

I have a sheet of burr walnut that was supplied by a car conversion company
not sure how old it is (came from an auction) and never found a use for it yet
it seems to be bonded to a substrate and a formica rear that is white, about 8-10mm thick in total I recall
I guess this was the "cheats" easy way to do it yourself dashboard

Steve

 

[Farmer Giles]

I did the dash of my 1969 TVR Vixen with burr Walnut a good few years ago. It all went well initially, I used animal glue. It all went pete tong when I finished it. I used several coats of sanding sealer followed by polyurethane varnish. It looked fantastic to begin with, and being a bit of a leaky bucket it resisted water well. But one sunny day, the sun warmed it up and the varnish started to blister. I sold the car to a mustachioed air force wing commander type who promptly wrote it off, taking all the gauges back out to refinish it would have been the only way to fix it, but I sold it to fund a new bathroom which avoided that pain.

 

[Lons]

I did the dash of my 1969 TVR Vixen with burr Walnut a good few years ago. It all went well initially, I used animal glue. It all went pete tong when I finished it. I used several coats of sanding sealer followed by polyurethane varnish. It looked fantastic to begin with, and being a bit of a leaky bucket it resisted water well. But one sunny day, the sun warmed it up and the varnish started to blister. I sold the car to a mustachioed air force wing commander type who promptly wrote it off, taking all the gauges back out to refinish it would have been the only way to fix it, but I sold it to fund a new bathroom which avoided that pain.

Has the burr walnut in your bathroom blistered yet? :lol:

Only in jest! I would have kept the car and sod the bathroom. :wink:

 

[Ttrees]

I forgot to mention the heat ....
Hide glue will re-activate itself again once heated ..
I've heard luthiers (TJ Thompson) uses hide exclusively for this very reason....
Guitars in their cases can get to 110 degrees inside a car in 10 mins r something along the lines of that...
I think its in a youtube video gourmet guitars ...
I think it would be a good idea to see what the best exterior finish for this application...
I presume farmer Giles didn't use shellac is because it's delicate ...especially when sweaty hands are concerned...
Maybe an epoxy pore fill ...
Todd Stock does a youtube video on the subject, might be worth a look .

 

[tomatwark]

I used to do a lot of these.

Before I had a bag press I would use clamp flat bits between 2 bits of ply with paper over the veneer and piece of camping mat between the paper and ply.

There was enough resistance in the camping mat to take up slight variation in the veneer.

You will need to flatten it first and also I used to used cascamite to lay it and leave it over night.

If you dash is curved you will need to make a caul.

The first one was a fun project, having to figure out how to do it with limited kit, after 1-2 a month over a couple of years if got a bit boring, especially the sanding.

 

[Farmer Giles]

I did the dash of my 1969 TVR Vixen with burr Walnut a good few years ago. It all went well initially, I used animal glue. It all went pete tong when I finished it. I used several coats of sanding sealer followed by polyurethane varnish. It looked fantastic to begin with, and being a bit of a leaky bucket it resisted water well. But one sunny day, the sun warmed it up and the varnish started to blister. I sold the car to a mustachioed air force wing commander type who promptly wrote it off, taking all the gauges back out to refinish it would have been the only way to fix it, but I sold it to fund a new bathroom which avoided that pain.

Has the burr walnut in your bathroom blistered yet? :lol:

Only in jest! I would have kept the car and sod the bathroom. :wink:

I was about 21 and it was my first house, a bit of a wreck and I found out that a) bringing back girls to a house with prehistoric bogs was not condusive to furthering relationships, and b) girls tend to think your a bit of a wolly with a sports car.. seling it was a win/win I did enjoy driving it though.

I knew next to nowt about finishing wood and it was pre internet so I was not able to use marvelous forums like this, its amazing we got owt right in them days.

 

[worn thumbs]

The OP admits to having never done anything like this before,is this related to dashboards in general or veneering itself?If its veneering,I would strongly urge a bit of practice before attacking a highly visible part of your pride and joy.I would also caution that burr walnut is not the easiest of materials to deal with.I would say that there are several challenging aspects of the project;flattening and joining the leaves of veneer ,bonding it to the substrate,cleaning up the surface for a durable finish and then applying said finish.

 

[siggy_7]

TVR Griffiths and Chimaeras are known for cracking in the original walnut veneer dashes, a number of people have had a go at replacements so some useful experience to be found online with a search. Currently have the dash off my Griff if you want any close up pics of how it's made.

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