Gear Shift Panel

[NEILJ]

I have attached a picture of my scuffed gear shift panel, something that I have wanted to fix for ages as it really niggles me.

Has anyone out there ever fixed this sort of thing or is it an expensive new panel.

Any suggestions would be appreciated.

And of course a happy new year to one and all on the forum.

Neilj

[steve2006]

You could either spray it or perhaps some of that stick on carbon fibre stuff?

[john leeds]

Look on the big auction site, there's a couple being broken up, you could try and get a replacement, respraying would work but then you would need to get new decals from somewhere, I would definitely try to get a new one.at least it would be right. I wish you luck with your choice.

[NEILJ]

Thanks John and Steve for your replies.

Being that it is the Christmas break and I had some time I bit the bullet and looked on the net about taking it all apart and respraying the offending part. I have to say I hate these jobs and delving into the unknown but taking my time and being extra careful I succeeded in getting the panel off. Have to say that the silver paint comes off with very little sanding and not the quality you would expect. Anyway masked it and sprayed it with my airbrush kit and put it all back together. The compromise is that the decals have gone but have seen you can get water slide Decal printer paper and print them off yourself and the other compromise is the park neutral and drive are now not backlit. A new panel is in the region of 200 pounds from what I have seen on the net so I can put up without the backlighting for that much. So see below the finished result, I think it is an improvement on the before pictures above.

Neilj

[Neil E]

Yeah, looks very good.

[ColinBarber]

Looks much better :)

[alphacat]

How did you lose the backlighting ?

[NEILJ]

Peter

On the silver panels, I don't know about the earlier ones, the panel is clear plastic underneath a black primer and a silver top coat. So they must a letter mask on before painting and peel off to reveal a clear letter shaped window that illuminates from the back light. The actual shift still is illuminated but the letters have gone because I have painted the lot. I thought of trying to cut out letters with electrical tape or something but my eyesight these days is not sharp enough. However as I have mentioned you can print letters on your ink jet printer onto a special water slide transfer paper a bit like the old airfix kit transfers and apply them, you can then overpaint with acrylic lacquer to permanently fix. This I am intending to do at a later date to finish off.

Neilj

[john leeds]

You can buy these sheets of letters and numbers from hobby shops, you just rub them onto the surface, it's easy cheap and quick, as for the backlight it would take a steady hand to put a decal letter on and then remove it with the paint underneath, tricky.

[NEILJ]

John

I am on the case of getting the transfer paper or letters you mention it used to be called letraset at one time. You are right about cutting out a mask though not practical to achieve a good result.

Quite satisfied with the panel though, something that will not draw my eye to it everytime I get in the car. Perhaps I should have not bought the car with issues like that but some people think you are mad to be so fussy but I am that character and overlooked it at the time of purchase and admired the car for its positive attributes. Then a couple of months after it was arrrgh I must fix that.

Neilj

[john leeds]

Be careful, my car was perfect apart from a couple of marks on the body, I've hade it done and now I have different marks, back seats broken, boot seals damaged and boot is sitting 8mm high, they have killed my car even lexus can't fix the boot. A new catch is 750 +vat, he must of locked keys in boot and forced it up to retrieve them.

But he does have a broken hand now I shut it in another car door,

[alphacat]

Clever those Japanese... But it actually makes it quite fiddly to sort ... as you say its probably easy to live with though