My Double D Fab dash. adventure

To me it is kind of funny, some people think that if you like a classic vehicle, you have to like everything about it exactly as it came off the assembly line. That's not me. I like tinkering with cars. I have a couple mustangs. and even an old 90 YJ jeep wrangler. I love tearing things apart and making them "better", at least more to my personal taste. I was big into restomodding way back before that was even a word. I like to take a vehicle and make it better. which in my world means upgrading performance to suit the uses I intend to put the vehicle, and upgrading aesthetics to what I like. sometimes that matches what others like, sometimes it doesn't.
I love the lines of the classic bronco, I have wanted one for 20 years. but there were a few things I did not like. one of which was, I have never liked the Bronco dash and that big round gauge cluster off center of the steering wheel. I just don't like it lol.

So after buying my truck I was perusing this forum and I saw AZ73's build and I loved what he did with his dash. I had also already customized the dash in my jeep and I really liked the gauges I used in it, so I wanted to do something similar in my Bronco. one of the first things I did after getting my bronco was to order a dash from BC broncos. unfortunately I fell right into the gap they developed when they switched suppliers so after waiting six months for my dash I started looking elsewhere. I have seen a lot of nice dashes on my yj fanatics forum that Dan Dilner of Double D fab built, so I contacted him and asked him if he would consider branching out into the Bronco world. As it happens he has a good friend with an EB and they had talked about building a dash for him. so he was up for the challenge.

I made up a sketch of what I was basically looking for and I took a bunch of measurements.




then I just sent him all the stuff I had collected for the dash. including my old dash, the original dash pad, a new plastic glove box, a new plastic defrost duct, a used glove box door with no vin tag. and the measurements for the gauges I had ordered.

I had started to do a dash overlay before he returned my email.
so I had already cut the glove box door out and welded it into my wild horses dash overlay. so I sent the overlay, and a bunch of pictures as well.














after many back and forth emails and a couple of renderings he sent me a pdf of both the original dash, and the dash he proposed for me.





more to come.

unfortunately my gauges did not get made until after I had sent all the parts so he did not have actual gauges to work with when fabricating this. but they did arrive before the dash was completed



then about 3 weeks later I get an email that says my dash is done and he sends me these pictures.







he shipped everything back to me, the dash was packaged very securely in a plywood crate.

so I started mocking it into place. everything fits very well, the holes are all lined up correctly. everything works!

I am not sure yet whether I will use a new dash pad, or get a dash pad cover or just leave it bare metal.









I am going to reverse the shift lever and bend it to better position it. I intend to install a double din stereo in the under dash cubby. I have a bus bar I will be installing on the back to make grounds easier.

I considered adding the ac vents into the dash, but I decided I liked the clean simple look of this dash better, so they will mount in the pods under the dash.


my wild horses tilt column and steering wheel arrived yesterday as well as my billet column cover so I will get those mocked up as soon as I get some time. I need to find a replacement for the column seal retainers. my originals are in pretty bad shape. then I'll tear it all apart, primer it and set it aside till paint time lol.

but overall, I am very happy with the design. when I was going to do it with the wild horses overlay, I was going to just flat mount the gauges which would have been a lot easier, but I really liked the look of the "gauge pods".

since Dan now has the build information for the stock dash in his cad file he says he is ready to take orders for anyone else looking for a complete custom dash. https://www.doubledfab.com/

Pretty cool!

That looks awesome!!! Great job!

That looks great! Can't wait to see the finished product.

Great story and looks pretty darn good

Thanks for sharing. Don't blame you for making it your own. That's what it's all about

Nice looking dash. At some point I'm gonna have to do mine after I get the lockers and extra lighting set up. Then gotta figure out where to put all the switches for a permanent home.

Ididit tilt column from wild horses. mocked and the high beam indicator mocked into the column cover.

and after this picture, I tore it all out and sanded it down, drilled the holes to anchor the defrost ducting. I also ground down the gauge pods on the back of the dash to give me more anchorage for the gauge anchor rings.

and then I mounted a bus bar for ease of finding grounds. then I painted the backside with eastwood rust encapsulator. as soon as that dries I will primer the front side and then box it up and store it till it is time to paint.

Thats really nice, great job.