aspire dash in a festiva

[aithanmier]

just playing around with the idea of taking my dashboard from the aspire and fitting it into the festiva...at the very least i would have to relocate the mounting tabs. worst case it's entirely too wide. i'm at work right now so i can't check till i get home. i think it would look pretty slick though, not to mention using the aspire heater core/ duct work would give me in dash heat too....if i do i'm gonna be running aftermarket gauges, probably a set of those awesome new autometer nexus, i e-mailed them and they said they were planning on releasing the in dash speedo and tach for the set by the end of the year.
I'll keep you guys posted.

[SimonTuffGuy]

It doesn't work... I've already tried it and I ended up cracking my windshield by attempting it.

The frame is all wrong, trying to mount it on the Festiva frame didn't work either.

With the frame removed, it fit "ok" but there were big gaps at the top by the windshield on both sides and it stuck out way too far. Then you'd also have no frame and it would be flimsy.

[aithanmier]

we'll see i might have to fabricate a frame for it, and i was pretty sure that the windshield curvature would be off, all that can be fixed with a little hard work and some fiberglass work if it turns out to be more trouble than i think it's worth i'm just going to lay in a custom fiberglass dash. the stock dash just sucks, i want some real gauges and something a little more modern looking.

[SimonTuffGuy]

Just telling you what I saw when I tried it in my car, that's all...

[aithanmier]

yeah i see what your talking about, the only place that the frame interferes is the steering column mount in the festiva. in the aspire the column mount is part of the dash frame instead to a chunk of metal on the firewall. all i'll have to do is cut that off the firewall and then weld in some mounts for the aspire dash. i'll probably also have to trim up the front edge of the dash to match the festiva windshield line. the dash may be a tad too wide, so i'm gonna uninstall the dash from the frame, trim the edge and fit it in to check that out. could be a deal breaker.

[SimonTuffGuy]

If you read my post, you'll see that I already told you... I removed the dash from the frame... The dash doesn't fit the lines of the windshield. Aside from that, the defroster vents are all off and it sits out way too far.