1303 dash.. the whole deal

[super vw]

Originally Posted by trevorbrady

I have a 1303 (complete with curved windscreen ). It's a bit of an anomaly, it's got later 2-bolt front struts and later 3-point seats but is on a '72 registration. It has had some resto work done in the past (by previous owners, I'm the 8th!) so it may have had a body/chassis swap at some stage. Check my site for pics etc... (www.geocities.com/veewrx)

I saw a pic in Kieth Seume's "new custom handbook" of a bright green 1303 with a painted steel dash (i.e. looked like the rubber "safety" dash had been removed from the steelwork.) this is why I presumed the 1303 had a steel structure going on under the rubber moulding.

I'm still confused though. To fit one of these 911 style dasboards, do you remove the rubber safety padding from the 1303 (curved screen) and fit the 911 one in its place, or do you fire up the grinder and cut away the steel sub structure? This is why I ask, because the '03 has a raised binnacle for the gauge, and I also presumed that it would have been steel. It looks like this might interfere with one of those 911 style dashboards.

LOL, well like we said, the 911 style dash replaces the existing dash. You dont NOT need to strip the stock dash to metal, you simply un bolt it and take some part off (go to superbeetlesonly.com on how to do this, its in there tech section).
The beetle you saw in the book ( i had that book, dont know what happened to it though) had its STOCK dash striped of all foam and plastic and was smoothed out and repainted. i have seen a few people do this, but its hard work and takes some time to do it right. I striped mine down to metal before i got my 911 style dash, i was going to graph in a 914 gauge pod, but that project ended once i found a 911 dash for cheap.