Hey guys I'm looking at a 1980 with low miles but has a cracked dash. I've been out of the rotary game a few years, how hard is this to swap, assuming a good one is to be had? Or is there another option besides a crappy dash cover?

 

Its time-consuming (a long day for me) buy certainly doable. Getting ahold of the PARTS MANUAL (or PDF electronic version) would be a big help so you get a sense of all the fasteners and what and how it all comes apart. There is no special tools required, and by today's standards of complex dashes, these are actually very straight forward.

I did a How-to dash removal here some years ago that I "think" was put in the Archive, so that might be worth a look.

As you say, finding a decent pad is prob the bigger problem. There is a thread here now about repairs you might want to check out, but it seemed "iffy"...

Best of Luck!
Stu Aull
80GS
Alaska

 

The dash is actually not that difficult to remove nor that time consuming. The only problem is you end up removing a lot of unnecessary components the first time you do it which makes it time consuming.

I believe if I'm not mistaken there are 10-12 8mm bolts that hold it on and a couple screws around the gauge cluster and the electronics that need unplugging.

The Haynes manual does not show any interior parts so it really is no help in this case.

2 8mm screws on both sides of dash cover
2 (maybe 4) 8mm screws inside the glove compartment
and 4 (maybe 6) 8mm screws that are underneath the dash cover that you can only get at by going through the glove box and reaching in awkward angles to the rear of the cover. (these were the hardest ones to find)

Then there are about 4 screws that hold the rear trim piece on that touches up to the glass. This will also need to be removed to pull the cover off.

If you get into it and need help let me know. I just got done doing this about a month ago.

(I apologize for not having exact counts as I am not by my car at the moment but if you need them I could count them up for you)