Quote:
Originally Posted by marinabrian
A real wood dash is backed with perforated aluminium, a plastic one is...well plastic 
Brian  |
Plastic ones have smooth aluminium backing and you can see where the plastic is heat riveted to the backing and as Brian has said the the plastic ones look plastic.
The Airbag lettering on real wood dash's airbag sections are flush with gold lettering, whereas plastic ones have a badge with silver coloured letters and is set into the 'plastic wood'.
The fit around the air vents is better with a real wood dash, with no gap between the plastic vent and the wood dash.
Lastly the quality of finish of a real wood dash is far superior, depth of colour, polish and luster that is more akin to an upmarket car.
Early car up to around 2001/2 were fitted with real wood dashes but more details can be found here, with pix of the two dashes
http://www.the75andztclub.co.uk/foru...ad.php?t=34369