Sadly I don't have this truck anymore (replaced with a 2007) but found these pictures while going through my phone's photo albums, figured i'd post for prosperity & to be a contributing member of the best society ever .

All the work was performed personally, so criticisms welcome. I performed the project while getting ready to move to California and while finishing a walker project for my infant son, sorry the pics of the finished project are while on my road trip. The following was the scope of the project

• Reduce reflections on the windshield when on & off road (this was learned after I simply refreshed the black plastic and had huge glares)
  • Premium suede hide on:
    • A pillars
    • B pillars (no pics I can find currently, had to have the area around the seatbelt hole professionally stitched)
    • Main large dash section
• Improve the look & "quality" feel by taking remaining black plastic parts and painting them a matching black to the exterior
  • Inspired by the Mercedes CLS piano black on dash trim (wife's car)

The process on plastic trim was the following:

• Scuff & sand thoroughly
• Etching primer
  • sand smooth
• High build primer (orange)
  • sand smooth
• High build primer (white)
  • sand smooth
• 4 coats of black paint (rattle can, I know I know, but wait till you see the results)
  • color sanding between coats
• 2 coats of clear coat
  • sanding between coats

Lessons learned:

• Clearcoat at the time of pics needed final cut & polish so it looks a little rough
• Quality suede is expensive
• With time & patience, a quality result can be achieved

Once everything was put back together is when I noticed the huge reflections on the dash (and promptly covered the main dash section & gauge cluster in suede)

 

 

 

Nice work and yeah, you do not want any sort of a gloss finish on the top of the dash. lol