The Stovebolt Site Forums The Shop Area Interiors Need to replace lenses in the gauge cluster...

I pulled the gauge cluster out of my '65 truck to clean it up. There was a WHOLE lot of dust back in there.

In the mean time I have repainted the interior with Rustoleum aluminum (looks good) so that the dash is a bit brighter.

But, the colored lenses for gen, oil, hot and cold have all suffered a lot of sun damage...they are faded out in the shape of the gauge cluster cover.

Where can I get something to replace those little bits of colored plastic? I need some in red and some in green.

Anyone tried this?

Dave

Go to the closest hobby shop and get a sheet of .020" clear sheet plastic and some transparent red and green model paint. I used sheet plastic to make the filters for the turn indicators for my dash. I did take a liberty and used blue instead of the correct green, but that was more of a personal preference thing. Sheet plastic and paint is pretty cheap, easy to cut, too. Just work with it as far as # of paint coats to get what you feel looks right.

Great idea "longbox55", but just one thing. Did you mean translucent instead of transparent?

Hey Bill, that seems to have worked so far. I found a hobby/modeler shop. (Not a hobby lobby) They had clear plastic in two thicknesses, I went with the thicker stuff that was close to the lenses that came out.

Next I bought a small modeler's can of candy apple red and another of green spray paint.

I used the old lenses as a template to cut around to shape the new plastic. The chicken shears that came with my kitchen knife set worked great at cutting.

First experiment didn't work out so good as my flat clear enamel didn't work at all with the spray paint.

The next attempt worked better. (I just left off the flat which I wanted to use to add some fuzzyness to the lens so as not to see the bulb behind the paint.) After six coats (every 30 mins or so) of candy apple red the lens was the right color and not actually see through anymore.

The green was a little more difficult and required a couple more coats to get a decent color and translucency (?).

Now I will rebuild the cluster, should work out great. I'll post pics after it is in if people are interested.

Dave

I did mean transparent. Most hobby paints son't come in a tranlucent, though there are some in hobby acrylic, but they don't stick to the plastic very well.
When I did mine, I painted them from the backside. Perhaps the clear flat might work if you did it on the opposite side from the paint. That'll put a layer of plastic between the finishes.

Here's my dash from my '65 that I cleaned up. For the directional arrows and the two red indicator lights (which aren't used but fell apart as soon as I touched them) I was able to get replacement parts from one of the Chevy truck catalog companies out of California. The green caps (about 1" in diameter) came with replacement light tubes. For the red I was able to buy '67-'72 tubes with the red caps on them. I bought a new plexiglas overlay and painted the indicator needles on the gauges.

Here is the end result.
http://laanderud.com/65chevy/misc/gaugecluster.jpg

Lee

Wow Lee....yours is fancier than mine. I have like half that many gauges...and only two needles...speedo and fuel.

I'm jealous.

Anyway, as for the green turn signal lenses....mine were oxidized and had this kind a whitish film (old plastic) on them. I used 1200 wet sand paper for a bit and then some rubbing compound to clean them up. They are shinier than when original...but no longer have that oxidized layer on them.

What can I say... got lucky and found one with a factory tach (repros are now available) and added a Pontiac/Oldsmobile vacuum gauge. I like gauges.

One to watch on E-Bay right now for $50:
http://tinyurl.com/33qgnh

Lee