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Our thanks to John Smeltzer for most of these views of 1950 dashboards. As you will notice, the only difference between a 1949 & a 1950 dashboard is in the gauges. 1949 guages were more of a dark grey/black with block lettering while 1950 gauges had a dark black/green metallic finish with a slight softening of the corners on the block lettering. They are so close in appearance that it is sometimes hard to distinguish between them.
All 1950 dashboards were finished in a natural brown lithographed woodgrain EXCEPT convertibles and suburbans which were painted to match the exterior color of the car.
An interesting note: The gauge cluster bezel was chrome plated before woodgraining or painting. However, the quality of the plating was marginal since the only thing they worried about was the trim bar that runs all the way across the lower edge of the dash. Therefore, if you are thinking about exposing that chrome, you may have to have it replated before it will look really good.
Another thing you will notice in some of the photos below is that some of the steering wheels has a different horn button and do not have a horn ring on it. They are from P19 "Deluxe" models - all others being P20 "Special Deluxe" models.
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So, what do you do when the finish of your dashboard is so far gone that you have to do something with it?? One option is to paint it and add a little chrome. Reapplying a woodgrain finish to a dashboard is EXPENSIVE so a little imagination "can turn a lemon into lemonade".
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