dash repair kit

[kwm]

OK I admit it I played the sucker and bought one of these dashboard repair kits. I mean it looked professional enough. OK maybe it was me and not the kit.
Anyway, has anyone used one of these they are sold at most all auto parts stores. I had a very small 1/4 of an inch at best crack in my dash in that nook area where the pass. side meets drivers before the hump that goes over the gage cluster. The area I repaired is anything but unnoticeable.
As I read the instruction you were, for small cracks, to add hardening powder to the color matched little tubs then fill it in and finally hold a small swatch that matches the texture of your dash over the repair. Anyone used one of these?

[Patton]

Take it back if you haven't opened it. They are pure #$@&%$# junk.

[Evans, Marv]

I think it's pretty much impossible to fix dash cracks. One thing you might try to keep it from spreading is to take your drill with a very small drill bit. Drill a hole at each end (if possible) of the crack. That might keep it from spreading - for how long, nobody knows. The circular hole dissipates the tension where the crack is propagating itself.
Good luck.

[ruf-porsche]

Originally posted by Evans, Marv
............. The circular hole dissipates the tension where the crack is propagating itself.
Good luck.

In Engineering terminology's we would call that the stress point.

[kwm]

thanks guys, I wish I had not used the kit already but I did. If anything it made it worse (looks-wise). The directions said to feather the compound out form the crack. To help it look better (or actually bring it back to where it was before I started) I am going to try to take a razor and lightly scrape the stuff up leading up to the crack.

[Keith Perry]

My PO tried that, it looked really bad, and then the dash started curling. I cut it smooth, well sorta, with a butcher knife and an electric knife, and put a black plastic dash cover on. It looked great. It really looked great. That cap was about $100. It was on for a year before I lucked out and got a recovered leather dash on eBay for really cheap. The plastic cap looked as good when I took it off as it did when I put it on.

[kwm]

$100 not bad. Do you know where you got it?

[Keith Perry]

I still have it. You can have it. Give me your shipping address.