14, Dash

So, for the dash.......I have eventually fitted the dash into the car to have a look - this was a fiddly job as the thing is a little wobbly in terms of shape and the fixing are all at different angles so rather difficult to get holes to line up - unless you drill them, make them a bit bigger, then a little bigger, then massive - and then they fit!

So thought I would try out a few dial positions and pop the steering wheel on (donor one that came with column), and stalks to see how it all fits.

So the above dial positions seems very standard - then I tried this - which I quite like...doesnt look great in the photo but good in reality.....but who knows I will keep trying things.... I think this is one of those things that is all down to your personal choice

The 'helper' also wanted to have a go and took great delight in spinning the wheel...

One thing I did notice was that the wiper stalk is far too close to the body - the indicator one is fine however.  The annoying thing is that this is a newer stalk as the original one was broken. The old one however was a different angle and would have been fine - ffs!  This steering column is one part of the build I won't forget with the drama of getting it and fitting it and ...and...and....

It doesn't end either - As I cut the dash along the marked line from AK and its a little bigger thant the actual column shroud - so I will need to see what i do about that - it isn't covered yet so this may help but not sure it will solve the whole issue!

Also the column is missing the bottom shroud - fking column!!!!!  so I will need to hunt one of these down!.

So I have now managed to source a set of covers from ebay - just need to pick them up and the weekend so fingers crossed!

As for the dash layout I think i have finally reached a decision...after many attempts:

Boring

Smiley face - NO!

Eyebrows?

Just awful

Quite like this.

Winer....

So I think this is the best one in my opinion so this is the chosen one for at least now.....we will see.  Although the key switch needs to disappear as its not symmetrical, so this will have to go somewhere else!

So after all these trials and careful marking I drilled the holes for the water temp and pressure gauge in the wrong place - DOH!  so it actually looks like this now......but wasn't terrible still happy with the result.

Will add photo when I take one!

So from the issue mentioned above of the marked line on the steering column cut out not being correct I ave tried to recover this by marking out the difference and then taping the dash to some card, making a template in tape of where it needed to be and then filling the gap - we will see how it comes out....a mess or a solution???  we will see...