Page Forty-Five - A Dash of Burl

 

I Googled it, so it’s fact, Alpines didn’t leave Coventry, England with wood dashes, but burled walnut is so classy and looks brilliant!

My thinking was that I needed to lay in the (new) wiring harness before I started slapping all the other new parts on Alphie.  But the wiring harness is centered on the dash, meaning I wouldn’t know how much wiring to pull through the firewall etc. because the dash defines the harness’s placement.  So, I drug out my two dashes (from Alphie and the Organ Donor) and ripped into them.  (I’m not throwing a minty new dash into Alphie until I have made all the messes of buffing paint, installing glass, laying in interior panels etc. so that plan got shelved.)

I noticed some dash differences:

·    - Some of the gauges on Alphie’s dash have down facing needles.  All the Organ Donor’s gauges have up facing needles.  They’re all Jaeger gauges so either there is a model year difference or the lads on the line slapped in whatever gauges were in the bin when an Alpine landed in their station, or someone swapped them in the last sixty years.

Some are up-facing and most are down-facing needles. 
The down-facing needles are white, the others are orange

- Both plastic dashes have one more hole than the walnut dash.  The hole is for a second turn indicator light as best as I can tell.  When I get to it, I’ll scour the wiring diagrams to confirm that.

This hole isn't on the wood dash, not sure why

 - Alphie’s dash has black knobs on the heater controls whereas the Organ Donor’s has chrome knobs.  (I went with the chrome knobs because most of the pics I found online of ’64 dashes had the chrome ones, but not all.)

I think the black plastic knobs (above the dash, hard to see
in my crappy pic) go on '65 models, not sure though

- The Organ Donor’s air position heater control (on the left side with a center detent) has a broken switch, which is actuated by push/pulling the stem in and out.  I suspect it controls the blower motor, but I can’t find a forum post that even mentions a switch on the control.  (I’ll look into the mystery during the aforementioned wiring diagram scour.)

The arrow points to the broken switch. The control next to it doesn't have the switch. I think it controls the blower motor, needs more research.

After sixty years, it is difficult to determine if these differences are model year (factory) differences or the result of people keeping a car on the road or Rootes just trying to get cars out the door.  I’m trying to keep Alphie sporting the stuff he was born with, well, except for the walnut dash.

After I stripped the Organ Donor’s dash down to the plastic, I knew I wouldn’t be satisfied with black vinyl, so I started the wood dash hunt.  I first asked my neighbor how hard it would be to make a wood dash with a router.  His expression confirmed my suspicions; it would be a difficult, time-consuming and costly task with lots of discarded attempts.  He took the dash panel and asked some of his wood working mates with access to CNC routing equipment what it would take.

While he was exploring that option, I launched a Google assault.  I found one on Sports and Classics: British Sportscar Parts and Restoration’s website (sportsandclassics.com).  It seems they had bought the remaining stock from a gent who had been making wood dashes for Alpines and Tigers but had shut down his business.  They had one left, an Alpine dash (open cubby, no glove box door).  I immediately threw down my money!  FYI, my neighbor reported that it could be done, but not easily and probably more expensive than what I had paid for the online one.  Perfect solution!

Gauge Rehab:

Of course, I chose the best set from the two sets of gauges and refurbishing them wasn’t that difficult.  I disassembled each and bead blasted the components that the blaster would blast to bits.  Cleaned the glass, replaced the perished rubber bits with o ring material, clear coated the housings and brackets and cleaned the dials as best as I could without destroying the lettering.

Pro Tip:  The little needles are damned flimsy so delicate touch!

I didn’t determine if each gauge actually functions because I couldn’t figure out how and didn’t want to take the time.  I’ll fight that battle later.

Problems:

Keys:  This bit of research took about a week.  I discovered what perhaps you folk already know, when you picked up your new Alpine from the dealership, they gave you two keys, one for the ignition and doors and the other for the boot and console.  Sunbeam used two manufacturers (primarily):

·         Wilmot Breeden’s Union line of key blanks (FS series keys) for the boot and console.

·         L&F (Lowe and Fletcher) or Strebor (“Roberts” spelled backwards) Diecasting (RM series keys) for the ignition and doors.

Original L&F and Wilmot Breeden keys

Very worn, only 60 years old.  I get it!

Left, the originals Right, new cut-to-number keys.
The new blanks are very similar too.

Alphie has his original keys, but they are sorely worn. Next, I journeyed to the shed to gather all the locks: four door locks, four console locks (a friend gave me two old consoles), and two boot locks.  I found the numbers on all of them and found the set that matched the numbers stamped on Alphie’s original keys.  (If I had not had Alphie’s original keys, I would have put together a set that had numbers I could have cut.)  I cleaned and oiled each lock, and they are ready for action.

With Alphie’s original locks in hand, I set to Googling again.  I found Triple-C Motor Accessories (triple-c.com) who will cut keys to a number, not copy them.  (When you copy a worn-out key, you get a new worn-out key.  Cutting them to the number gives you a new, new key.)  Now Alphie has his original keys for show and clean set of newly cut keys for motoring.

Switch Holes:  The switch holes on the wood dash are single smidge too small.  I used my Dremel with a small sanding drum to CAREFULLY open the holes a smidge.

Switch Body Reliefs:  The switch holes didn’t have reliefs cut in the back to accommodate the switch body.  When I test fitted the switches, the switch stems were inset too far to allow all three positions on the three-position switches.  I used the router set-up on the Dremel to cut reliefs behind each switch to inset the switch body forward in the dash to give the needed clearance.  (See pic)  Sorted!

The arrows show where I routed in reliefs for the switch bodies.

Heater Control Mounts:  Wood dashes don’t have the heater control mounts, and all the places where you can buy them tell you that.  It’s not a difficult fabrication.  I just made an index card template from the plastic dash for the hole spacing and basic dimensions and tweaked it as I went.  I used 16-gauge Lowes sheet metal and the mighty MIG welder to glue it together.

I had to elongate the holes to allow me to fine tune how far the heater control stems protruded from the dash, easy enough.  I found that I had to file off some metal to prevent the control stem from rubbing against the mounts, easy enough.  I tried several combinations of stacked washers to center the stems in the slot in the dash, again, tedious but easy enough.

Custom fabbed heater control mounts.

Stacks of washers to position the slider stem in the center of the opening

Heater Controls Face Plate:  The cleaned and shined gauges, smashing!  The cleaned and sorted switches and lights, smashing! The heater controls face plate, rusty, dull, and unacceptable.  A quick bead blast would clear the rust but also the lettering too.  To the Sunbeam Alpine Owners Club forums – what had other folk done?  I found “Bobbo” who had printed some (thick, as it turned out) vinyl stickers and still had some for wayward Alpine restorers.  He sends you two stickers in case you screw one up – he knows who he’s dealing with!  A bit tedious, but blimey it looks good!  Thanks Bobbo!

The blasted and painted heater control bezel and it's new lettering

New vs Old - the new one is on the top, the old on the bottom

Clock: I have only one clock, and it’s not in great shape.  I doubt it works, but most car clocks from the 60’s didn’t work by the late 60’s, if ever.  I’m not terribly concerned that it works, but the clear plastic (not glass) cover is scratched, and the numbers are barely visible. 

It is a Smiths clock, and I like it better than the clock delete badge.  Maybe I can find a better one sometime.

The clock is in meh nick.  The numbers are faded and
the plastic "crystal" is scratched, and it probably doesn't work.

Switch Labels:  I’ll get new switches labels before I install the dash, you know, those little metal hangy down bits.  Hold your horses, people!

Next time – gas tanks!