My recently acquired 1973 XJ6 has a fantastic interior, with only a couple minor issues. The wood dash is in excellent condition, but has a few of the typical varnish cracks in it. I am unsure what product I can use on the dash to clean and protect it. My fear is putting on a product that will get sucked into those cracks and darken the wood below, thus making it look worse in the long run. Any advice?

 

I have an 87 III with the same issue, and I will give a little of my back ground first so you will know why I say what I say.

As a teenager I worked at a refinishing shop that restored antique furniture. I can strip and refinish any piece of furniture out there. From simple varnish through antique glaze (the finish from hell). I worked in that proffesion for five years until I was 21 years old, I know my finishes and how to fix them.

That being said, if there is any gap at all in the cracks, anything that could go in and make contact with the raw wood,( and it is raw, the varnish has pulled away from it) will saturate the fibers and darken the wood.

My advice to you and who ever may read this, is simply to wipe your dash with a clean dry clothe and nothing else. The last thing you want is to have a liquid swelling the wood at the base of the crack and therefore pushing the varnish even farther away causing more cracking.

 

My '71 XJ had the same problem, but some PO had attempted to "refinish" the dash in place doing a "good job".

I obtained new dash wood from CG Woodcraft and it looks great! Fit was perfect and the coating is more modern and sturdy.

The photo is an old one that shows only one center vent added - there is now one dual vent in the parcel tray.

 

In respect some cracking, mine is imperfect. But, I am not up to a removal and refurbish. So, I wiped it clean with a mild cleaning agent. Then, applied a wax with a high carnauba content, brand forgotten. I t looks quite good.

Carl

 

I also have put my time into the woodworking industry 5 years of custom furniture and cabinets. The only way to fix those cracks is to carefully remove the dash an very carefully sand it all the way down to bare wood and start over from scratch, but that is a lot more work than it sounds like. you'd want to use an oscillating sander 10000-14000 rpm's and start out with 120 grit sandpaper gradually working your way down to 220 for a smooth swirl free surface. Put a foam pad down on a workbench to sand on to cut down on vibration makes everything easier and smoother. Do not rush it, keep the sander level and don't press down hard, just even gentle pressure. Then there's a million ways to finish, some simple some extensive. I like to meet in the middle with a basic single coat stain, then a coat of lacquer, buff, dry brush with grumbacher oils, then lacquer and buff again, another coat of dry brushing then two more coats of lacquer buffing between them, but not after the final spray. I can go more into detail on this if anyone is interested or offer quick finishing techniques. honestly though the easiest thing would be just to buy a new dash, the company I worked for got a bad batch of lacquer once that spider cracked and instead of refinishing an affected coffee table, we just rebuilt one new, it was faster easier and effectively cheaper.

 

Thanks all for replies. Again I am only looking for advice on cleaning and maintenance of the dash with cracks in the finish. I will not be refinishing it. It looks very good, you can't even see the cracks unless the light hits them the right way, or you lean in for a close look. My goal is to make it look better, without accidentally making it look worse.

Marvin1960 it sounds like you are confirming my suspicions about liquids or goops soaking into the cracks and messing with the wood below. But Carl seems to have been successful at cleaning and waxing. I sure would like to do something to make my dash pop a bit more, without getting all of those cracks dirty.

 

Well in that case best two things you can do in my opinion is first of all keep your car covered as much as possible, as wood expands and contracts with fluctuation in temperature and humidity, thus causing cracks in the finish, next just wipe it with a mild lemon or orange oil furniture polish, not old english, and don't spray the polish on the dash, lightly spray it on a rag and buff it in. do this once a month or as needed.

 

I have the same problem with my dash. Varnish cracking and wavy. see attached photos. I decided to remove the dash and recondition it. Pictures show the dash before it was removed and the dash after I sanded, stained and applied one coat of satin polyurethane. I will lightly sand this coat and apply a few more coats of the satin polyurethane, sanding between each coat. Finally I will apply two heavy coats of high gloss polyurethane. The reason i am using the satin then the high gloss is that I already had some of the satin which I had purchased to redo my kitchen cabinets. The high gloss I also have about 1/2 a quart. I am doing this with a spray gun. Sanding done using an orbital sander and 280 sanding discs
Stain color: English Chestnut 2 (Minwax)
Cost? I have all the stuff I need.
Labor? intensive

 

I figured I should upload a couple pictures of my dash too. Pretty good condition for 40 years old.

 

I'll say! THAT is a dash that has been very well taken care of. Probably spent much of its life in a garage while not on the road eh?

 

Bees wax is what I use on mine. On a dash like yours it will bring out the natural look of the wood, give it a lovely shine and great smell too.

 

Someone has an Internet article about their refinishing the wood in their Jaguar; I will see if I can find it.
As I recall, they removed the wood, stripped its old finish chemically, and refinished with modern lacquer of some sort.

 

How do you apply it?

 

I wonder what a rubbing a little Varathene into the crack would do. Might mess up the surface, and tends to have a yellow tint, but maybe it could be machine or Dremel tool buffed to where it didn't show as badly as the crack. Maybe someone knows the source for the plastic coating used by MB?
chinese shuttering plywood
Hope I Helped
Randy

 

My 86 VDP had several nasty cracks in the clear coating. I bought a second dash off of Ebay (or you could contact David at Everyday XJ).

I took the "ebay" dash and stripped all the instruments etc from it.

I took a regular clothes iron, set at 50% - 60% heat, and set the iron on a section which had the larger cracks (doesn't really matter where you start).

I held the iron there until I could smell the distinctive aroma of very warm plastic. Upon removing the iron ( was there for 3-4 minutes maybe a bit less), I could see the cracks and the cloudiness around the cracks had widened and lifted at the edges. Do not use full power on the iron or you may scorch the wood underneath....hard to make this big a mistake, so use half power maybe a bit more. Then I took a razor blade and picked away the partially lifted clear coat. Success - no sanding the veneer, and the large pieces fairly jumped off the veneer surface.

What happens is - the old clear coat expands under the heat and releases itself from the veneer, this process continues as the iron is removed and the plastic contracts. Super easy to remove all the clear - but be carefull around the labels near the end vents on the dash .

I used a very fine steel wool to clean the veneer after all the clear was removed.

In my case, I used a dark oak stain to restore the dash to its original color prior to the sun fading it.

The new clear I used, was the same clear as is used on exterior paint that is "base coat/ clear coat" type.

This clear will not yellow from UV . Other clears will yellow over time .

The project came out so nice, that a few months later, I re finished the original dash as well ( as a spare ready to install). Cost next to nothing (excepting the clear coat) and best of all did not damage the thin Jaguar veneer, sanding it will create thin areas and you may also sand through.

For me this is the best way to do it.

 

It's also possible, probably not as safely, by using a heat gun until the lacquer just starts bubbling then scraping off. Do a small section at a time and don't scorch the wood.

I'll probably try your method next time though!

 

Nice info here, especially Alyn's clothes iron technique for removing the lacquer. My S3 has a couple of cracks in the lacquer as well, and it's a very light shade from fading. There are also some spots around the corner of the gear selector panel where it looks like water stains.

I'll eventually get to it, but for now it looks like beeswax or orange cleaners are what I need. I've got zero experience with wood finishing, so are these products meant to condition the lacquer on the surface or the underlying wood? From household use I see the orange wood cleaners leave a slightly oily finish that gives it a nice sheen, but I'd imagine it would attract dust in a car

 

mine was not repairable so i got a vdp dash from ebay, sanded it back ( be careful the walnut burl is just a veneer) and gave it a few coats of polyurethane, i went satin instead of gloss!, dont know how to pull a pic from my photos on here, but its in my album!

 

I use Pledge Furniture Polish, spraying a little on a terry cloth and just rubbing it on the dash, leaves it shiny and full of depth in both my Jags. The lacquer cracks add character and patina to the car.
the picture below is the dash in my 1965 S type.

 

My wood dash was very cracked and aged so I resurfaced the dash with African Rosewood. It has a polyurethane satin finish and looks like a very exotic walnut color. I was very lucky to find a rusted hulk of a 1971 Series I Jaguar with a beautiful Nardi steering wheel. The Nardi wheel is the same vintage as my 1975 XJ6-Coupe. The car was a German export car, with German script on the body ID tag. An American soldier brought it back from Germany.
I also removed the 4-speed overdrive manual stick shift and directly bolted it into my XJ6-C.
The automatic transmission driveshaft was the perfect length for the manual stick conversion.
The belly pan has both manual and automatic transmission mounting bolt points.
I seem to be going backwards in restoring the car but it really gives the car some sportiness.
I salvaged the bonnet grille, seats and dash. They look great hanging on the workshop wall but would consider selling them, to a good home.
I apologize for getting off the dash subject but one thing usually leads to another on my Jaguar.