Remove S2 Dash Top

How to remove the dash top from an S2 Elise

The process is described in the S2 Service Manual, section BP pages 19-21. My car (2002 model) was a little different to the manual however so the following guide might be useful.

Remove both front speaker grilles and speakers

Straightforward.

Remove both speaker panels

On the driver's side one you will need to disconnect the hazard warning light switch. The manual says to disconnect everything but it's not needed and not obvious to me how to disconnect the light switches anyway ! The picture below shows what to disconnect (lower green circle)

Behind the driver's side speaker panel

Remove plastic capping panel

The manual says to remove the air vents from the panel. Only the topmost rotating bit needs to be removed here. On my car there were 2 screws in each vent attaching the capping panel to the dash facia panel. These are not mentioned in the manual, and will need to be removed. The capping panel can then be pulled free (with a bit of force !)

Remove the two screws holding the dash facia to the frame. The drivers side one is shown on the picture above (upper green circle), and the passenger one is found likewise.

Plastic capping panel removed

Remove steering column upper and lower shrouds

The lower shroud is held on by two screws (on my car anyway - the manual says 3 screws...), as shown below. The manual says to disconnect the trip button but I didn't see a need to - the wire is long enough to let the shroud rest on the floor while you continue working

The upper shroud is held on by four screws as shown below

Shrouds removed

Remove instrument pack

The instrument pack is secured by two bolts (M11 IIRC), one of which is shown below

Disconnect the wiring harness from the instrument pack

Instrument pack removed

Remove dash top

The manual says to remove the plastic finished above the climate controls : I did this but it was a pointless exercise and you don't need to remove the pastic at all.

Now remove the dash top by lifting the nearmost edge of the dash (to release the locating bosses from the keyhole slots in the dash) and pulling it towards you.

Re-fitting

Basically the reverse of the above. Only tricky bit is re-assembling the steering column shrouds and instrument pack : loosley assemble the shrouds first before replacing the instrument pack and then tighten everything up.

The image below shows the keyhole slots (bottom green circles) and spigot pin holes (top green circles) that the dash top slots into on refitting.