I tried the JB Weld solution and its working so far. I waited until the hottest part of the day so the dash pad was soft and easy to work with. I used the quick dry formula. I jammed thin strips of wood (paint stirring sticks that I'll call jam sticks) between the windshield and Dash pad to apply pressure to the dash pad while the adhesive dried. I didn't actually have these jam sticks pressing down directly on the dash pad as that might damage the material so I laid the extra strips of wood down on the dash pad so the jam sticks were pressing on the wood and not the dash pad. The benefit of using pain sticks was that they bend a little and that made this process easier. The new problem was the dash pad shrunk and I could not pull it enough to cover the entire dash surface and that left a gap. Result after JB Weld dried.


To cover the gap I cut a long strip from a piece of house siding bottom rail that I found at the Lowes. Here is the material.


With the factory edge towards the windshield I slid the plastic strip under the top lip of the instrument panel trim plate to fit it. I left it in place for a few hours in the heat before taking it out for painting. By leaving it in place it kept its new shape making it easier to fit back in place after painting. Here is the strip before painting.


Here is the painted strip in place. If I took more time fitting and cutting the plastic strip it would look a lot better, but this is good enough for now.


Dave
2003 Aztek

That's about as good as it is going to get. I have a 2001 that did that and I eventually glued it down with either contact cement or weatherstrip adhesive, I forget which. The pad had definitely shrunk. I just live with the gap. The elegant thing to do would be to put some sort of homemade rim piece over the gap that will itself not come up.

The only way to actually fix it is to replace the dash. The dash pad is not separate. The dash, as somebody mentioned is unavailable but if it was, the price was $1100 from the dealer. I thought I might get one from the junkyard, where they are plentiful. The problem is, it took me 5 hours of continuous work to get it out. And EVERYTHING in the front of the car has to be disassembled. The shifter cable goes through it. Everything, A/C, Radio, wiring, steering column, instrument cluster, console, is either attached to it or goes through it. And I wasn't exactly being meticulous when it took 5 hours to get it out. So to pull the old one, make sure all the wires and routing and clips and everything was marked and documented and to be careful not to strip or break anything, would have taken me 15 hours more hours to pull the shrunken one and replace it with a good one. In the end, I decided to live with the gap.

But now I have a similar problem with my other Aztek. I took the trim off the dash to send the instrument cluster out for repair and while I was waiting to get it back, the 140 degrees inside the car separated the dash pad from the dash. The pad is not shrunk, but it is separated a good 6 or 8 inches back and pretty wide and the old glue has no adhesion at all. Whatever glue I used on the one with the gap was only sort of OK. A year later it is coming up a quarter inch here or there on the front edge of the gap. I am reluctant to use a rigid epoxy like JB weld so I am looking at various forums and they seem to like DAP Weldwood in a spray can or a gallon can. Since I know the edge on this one will tuck back under the trim edge, because it is NOT shrunk, I am temped to just use the weatherstrip adhesive or rubber cement and smear it in the gap with my finger and whatever thin tool I can get back in there with.  There is no way to get the old glue off either surface, so you are really gluing glue to glue, not vinyl to the resin dash.

Any opinions on the best adhesive for this?

By the way, both of my Azteks had the Versatrak failure. #1 got a replacement from the junkyard.  #2 had the thing removed and discarded. Except for having to live with the warning light, #2 is the better solution. Nobody rebuilds them, they are crap, the junkyard one will fail eventually also, and a new one from the dealer costs $3300.

I have the same problem with my 2002 Aztek. What I would like to do is to get my hands on a little, "DAP Weldwood Contact Adhesive, Landau Top and Trim, High Heat Resistant Contact Cement.  Take a heat gun and see if the dashpad could maybe stretch a little, apply the Dap and then take ziplock bags filled with sand to lay on top of the dash pad to hold it down while the contact adhesive sets up. That is my dream for Pac-Man.

The plastic trim strip idea is awesome-and it looks great!

I live in the PNW where it doesn't get hot enough for this to happen, at least it hasn't yet.

WRT the Versatrak issue, I guess I'm lucky mine's still good at 231K miles.  I just change the expensive fluid every several years..  it's groaning again so I need to do that soon.  Someday it will fail, but I will rebuild it as I've rebuilt other limited slip differentials before, it can't be that tough.  Should probably buy the overhaul kit while I still can.