roadkill cement mixer truck hood brace = my new dash

[a.d._510_n_ok]

the vinyl dash pad on my '80 510 was rotten when I got it in '08 so I ripped it off and have been running topless ever since and it looks like wombat barf (see pic 1).

 

 

a few months back one of our mixer trucks had a fiberglass hood fall apart from our wonderful Oklahoma roads beating it to death. I scrounged the fiberglass brace out of it and have slowly been chopping it into the right shape with an angle grinder and a thin cutting disc.

 

 

 

note: the gray crap on the flat part of the piece that looks like fourteen years of road grime is fourteen years of road grime accumulated after almost a decade and a half of being on the front end of a Sterling mixer - hadn't washed or sanded the piece yet. The carnie "molest you behind the funnel cake trailer when you get off the tilt-a-whirl" green is actually my company's fleet color. my pic's didn't capture it but the piece really has some neat contours that mimic a factory dash pad. I may build two end pieces out of some black expanded metal that I also salvaged from the truck (grill pieces) and do away entirely with the swivel defrosters.

 

here are a few pics of the piece in the daylight:

 

 

 

the white area in the last pic is where the air cleaner for the mixer was mounted & had been concealed from the factory paint. It was revealed when I spilt the piece to get the contours I wanted.

 

Eventually, this will all be some shade of blue.....or fleckstone bwahahahaha!!!!! fleckstone for an early 1990s flashback!

[a.d._510_n_ok]

out with the old ~

 

 

in with the new ~

 

[bananahamuck]

now you'll have to paint your C clamps to match.

[a.d._510_n_ok]

bolted the thing in. only blue paint I had was fomoco valve cover blue on hand and I can't drive anywhere so I had to make do. still haven't decided what I'm gonna do end cap wise.