[Candyman]

Hey Jered,

Best advice on filling the gaps is, as suggested to cut some filler panels out of plastic to fill the gaps and add something for putty to bite to, then fill it in with either putty of fiberglass like I used, then coat with a body filler, sand the entire part, use a good primer / surfacer, sand some more, and then prep and paint it using a good high grade base coat / clear coat system in your body color consisting of acrylic enamel / acrylic urithane. Then color sand the part out, buff, glaze, and wax to a high gloss finish to match the rest of your interior.

The only problem I am afraid you are most likely to run into is going to be, since it appears that you went ahead and cut the entire lower cross member out of your center bezel, and not added any additional support, your bezel is going to have a great deal of flex in it under normal everyday driving conditions, and without that support, pretty much any type of putty, or relate type of material you try to introduce in order to fill your gaps, and so forth is ultimately going to crack under the stress of not having that needed cross member, and will also result in cracking or flaking off any paint as well. So I would address all three of those issues carefully to make sure you get the final assembly right before having an expensive problem later on. Remember, any time you take important structural supports out, you need to re-introduce them elsewhere or it is just a matter of time before the structure will ultimately fail on you.

What I would recommend, but would be a ton of work, would be to remove and relocate the bottom switch panel somewhere else, create a whole new cross member under your chassis to add the extra support you have removed in order to regain structural support, reduce flex in the material, and add strength, and then either use a filler like an EQ, or something else to fit, or create a small slot for storage. Then you shouldn't have any issues with any paint, or putty cracking, or any structural problems coming back to haunt you later on. Due mostly to the amount of custom work needed to do this kind of mod the right way, is why I usually try to talk people out of it. Their just isn't enough room for a Double DIN and still keep the necessary structure to support it without having to re-work the entire structure to hold it.

Please note that I am not trying to get you mad, or upset at me, but rather just trying to warn you as to what will likely happen unless the problems are corrected in an appropriate manner. I have seen way too many cool projects end badly as a result, and would hate to see it happen to you as well! Believe me, been their, done that, and its not pretty.

Anyways, you go easy, and I will catch you later.

Candyman