Dire Dashboard Disasters

[warren t claim]

I love a good dashboard but some car makers spoil a perfectly good car by inserting a monstrosity just in front of the wheel. Like this...

 

This to me is just a hideous plank of wood with a few holes drilled in it. Jaguar used to be masters at the elegant fascia, the Series 1 XJ6 is a visual masterpiece with its gauges and rocker switches but the reason I'm more inclined to want an X300 over an X330 is I'd prefer not to have to look at the late 1990s tunneled out instruments. 

 

I really don't care about things like clearly illuminated switches and the almost universal markings that car makers use these days, I'd rather have a switches function written on in English like Bristol or the Americans do or left unmarked to encourage new owners to actually learn the functions that each control does, like TVR used to. 

 

I'm not in the slightest bit concerned as to whether a dash has won a Design Council award, I'd have an early Mk3 Cortina fascia over a facelift version and I actually like the Swiss cheese Lancia Trevi effort, I just want to see something different when I'm behind the wheel.

 

Rant over! What are your least favourite dashboards?

[vulgalour]

That dashboard is only permissible if somewhere inside is a fully functional cocktail cabinet.

[John F]

This 'five minutes during a lunchbreak' utterly shit design gets my vote:

 

 

,,, because nothing says "quality" like a box on a fucking shelf, does it?

 

Honestly, how long did they spend thinking this up? Yes, I know it makes it easy to adapt from RHD to LHD, but I really don't care about that. That only benefits the incompetent communists that made the car, not the buyer.

[warren t claim]

The early SD1 was even worse, especially in 2300 misery spec with the rev counter cut out of the binnacle and then glued back together again.

[Conrad D. Conelrad]

I hate the dash in the Rover 213/216. Fine in the Honda, but in One of Britain's Fine Cars it's a nasty, clumsy thing. 

[Junkman]

I find this the most hopeless effort of EVAH:

 

 

Hence I love it.

[mouseflakes]

Peugeot 505 Dash. Original design was glorious - follow-up was heeeedious.

 

Mk1 - YUM!

 

 

 

Mk2 - BUM!

 

[tooSavvy]

Hillman IMP

 

.... Mk1. Proper nice   

 

.... Revised later in life. 

 

tooSavvy

[Pete-M]

That X308 dash is a bit of a minger. To be honest, I wasn't a huge fan of the dash in the X300, but it's less hideous than the later one and the XJR / Sport interior with the black wood works rather well I thought.

 

 

There are still moments of nastiness, the digital clock that both the X300 and X308 have is shared with the DB7. Never works in any of them. Also, the cruise control rocker switch always feels like it's about to fall off. You know that special "about to break" feeling that late 70s Marina indicator switches had?
 

[406V6]

Rant over! What are your least favourite dashboards?

Anything that doesn't have the speedometer in front of the driver where it's meant to be. Like Bini, Picasso, latest Primera

[dollywobbler]

Saab 9-5.

 

Some of the worst fake wood you'll ever see, hideous plastics and column stalks that sound like someone cracking their knuckles. Absolutely horrible.

 

Also, while I love the Citroen GS dashboard...

 

...us Brits got one that looked like it had been lashed together by someone building a kit car.

[Jim Bergerac]

I've never liked the interior of early S-Types:

 

 

Made to look all the poorer by the interior of the early Rover 75s released at the same time.

[twosmoke300]

saab dash is lovely !! once you get used to the fake wood anyway.

[Wilko220]

While it's not disastrous as an overall effort, something about the Rover 200 dash always bugged me - if you're going to be that stingy with the (pretend) wood, then why bother at all?

 

 

 

Similarly with the Rover 100. I mean, just how utterly toss does that little square of wood to the right of the steering wheel look.

 

[Faker]

Worst dash ever, has to be a toss up between the old fiat panda or the UNO. Dear god the cheap plastic ashtray that slid on/up/off the dash was horrific! Priceless!

[dollywobbler]

Good call on the posh 100s. Just sticking wood onto a dashboard really does look crap. It wasn't even recessed.

[Spiny Norman]

It's amazing the number of people going for Jaguar dashboards, I thought it was just me.

 

A couple of years ago I fancied an XJ8 but I got so fed up looking at ones with the horrible pale cream leather with brown walnut dashboards and these often usually filthy cream leather & wood-u-like steering wheels, rather than the (IMO) far nicer black leather seats & wheel with black wood that I had seen on one car but never again.

 

The other car I thought I wanted once was the original Lexus IS. I went to look at one, sat in it and within 30 seconds got out and never looked back. What made them think that the naff plastic trim with the childish clock style dash display and semi silvered steering wheel was acceptable? It was shamed by a Vectra, let alone a BMW or Audi, which the ting was supposed to be competing against.

 

[Barry Cade]

 

Mad^

 

V nice...

 

[brickwall]

mini

 

[Mr_Bo11ox]

What jag is that one that Warren T posted up then? It is spectacularly hideous I must agree.

[RobT]

E30 dash. Yes, controls are angled towards the driver and all that cobblers but quality of the plastics are a bit shit on them. Functional but dull. And considering how EPIC mk2 Senator's look from the outside, I always thought they could do with a better dash and steering wheel. A Renault 25 beats it on that score!

[Junkman]

Renault 15/17:

 

[Junkman]

Miserably dull grimness - Mercedes W126:

 

[Spiny Norman]

I'm having a hard time seeing what's dire or disastrous about that Merc one? 

Apart from some token slices of wood-u-like it's a good example of how a dashboard should look, circa 1980. 

[Pete-M]

I had one of those W126 Mercs, a 500 SEL which was, at the time it was made the top of the range Merc. Full on dictator spec. The dash isn't that different to the one in a base model 190E other than having a few more switches. A bit of a let down for what cost a fair old chunk of money back in the day.

As for miserable dashboards, have a Polski Fiat.

 

[londonm]

I find this the most hopeless effort of EVAH:

 

 

Hence I love it.

As nice as that looks in many ways, that rear view mirror must be about as useful as a marzipan dildo in that position surely?

[RedSparrow]

This 'five minutes during a lunchbreak' utterly shit design gets my vote:

 

 

,,, because nothing says "quality" like a box on a fucking shelf, does it?

 

Honestly, how long did they spend thinking this up? Yes, I know it makes it easy to adapt from RHD to LHD, but I really don't care about that. That only benefits the incompetent communists that made the car, not the buyer.

 

To be fair that was designed when the Metro was intended to replace the mini, hence why it looks like a slightly modernised mini dash.

[John F]

It's miserable and depressing, yet half-arsed and cheapskate at the same time. In that way, it reflects all that was wrong with the British motor industry in the '70s and '80s.

[Timewaster]

The Mk1 Metro dash is supposed to maximise interior space in a similar way to the Panda and Mk2 Fiesta.

I'm sure we have had a similar thread once before. I seem to remember googling 405 early and late dashboards. I love the early one, but the quality was pretty.. Well Peugeot. The later one was a bit "Meh" but better built.

[For Fiats Sake]

I was quite fond of the Maestro Clubfoot/van dash, apart from its hatred of cigarette packets, left on the passenger side of the dash, cornered, they fly out the opened window.  Top marks* to the anti smoking flid who dreamt that up.