Mounting Gauges

[patbarry]

I have the leather dash from Robert and when I try and mount the gauges, they won't fit in the holes. Seems the leather has made the diameter just a bit too small. I was thinking of sanding the hole to open it up, but am a bit worried about tearing up the leather finish. Any thoughts or suggestions?

[John Schneider]

Pat,
I assure you they do fit. Tight as hell but they do fit.
From what I remember the air vents were the only parts that I had to pull the leather from the back side off. The switches are no picnic but well worth it.
Here are a few pics as proof.
Try powder, KY or what ever you can get your hands on.
The heat on skin stuff is not really needed in this case. Powder did work fine for me.
John

[John Schneider]

number 2

[patbarry]

KY sounds fun, but messy. Kinda like most things in life. I'll give it a shot, thanks.

[40 Bud]

A little liquid soap or glycerine - even WD40 should do the trick.

[Ron Earp]

I had the same experience as John. I had to cut the holes too, in fabric as well as glass, but I think the newer ones are cut already. I used a couple of book references to get the spacing, number of switches, and gauges in the right places.

Cut the leather as little as possible to get the switch through. I usually used a razor knife, make an "+" shape cut, and then fed it through. Painful in some cases. Gaugues were tight too, but in the end the finished product looks fantastic. The air vents were difficult due to shape and contour in that area, but I managed to get them through there too except on one of them I had to leave the screw back off and make my own ducting there.

This is one area though that I feel the RF car has some nice attention to detail, although any of them could have it if folks take the time. Robert uses period style gauges which I like with proper layout instead of VDOs or Autometers I see in some cars. Just my preference to have period stuff, I think it looks right in black leather and is elegant as well as useful.