Restoring A 1966 Pontiac GTO's Dash - Dashing Renewal

The first part of the bezel painting process was to restore the matte black, found inside the gauge, turn signal, and high-beam indicator "pods." At the factory, templates were used when painting, rather than masking in the different areas. For us to make a similar template would be a long and tedious job, so we knew we were going with the masking route. We decided the easiest way to approach this job was to paint the black from the backside of the bezel, thus making the masking job on the front really easy. We simply masked off the turn signal/high beam faces

then we masked off the front face of the gauge pods en mass.

Masking the backside is not critical (you won't see it when it's installed), but we limited our painting area just to reduce any chance of errant overspray. Since we were painting plastic, the paint used was a can of matte black model paint we picked up at the local hobby store.

On our '66, there was also a small area of black underneath the top edge of the bezel, so the front side of the bezel was carefully masked, and we painted that area at the same time as the gauge pods.

Here's the nervous part: removing the masking tape without tearing off any of the new (read: expensive) chrome plating. To reduce the chances of ragged edges on the paint, the masking was carefully removed while the paint was still wet. To avoid damaging the plating, we did not use very sticky masking tape. We applied it gently, and peeled it back off at an angle as shown.

When fitting the new walnut veneer, it came up short in a few places. The chrome on the bezel face could still be seen around several of the edges, which just didn't look right.

So we took some black and ran it around the outer edges as

as well as around the gauge and indicator holes.

Once the black painted areas were taken care of, the next job was to apply the interior color paint around the outside of the bezel, so it was back to masking again.

Our '66 had a "219" blue interior, but all the paint shops we tried couldn't reference that color code. In the end, we took in a part with well-preserved original interior color (the driver's door actu-ally), and had the paint shop scan it to get the correct color. Here's the bezel after all the painting was complete.

Before installation of the reproduction wood veneer, available from many advertisers in HPP, we tweaked it for a good fit, then treated it to some Old English oil.

Like the original veneer, the repro wood included the aluminum strengthening layer, and a self-adhesive backing. Just peel and...