2014-03-28 56x Buick 5 gang switch

The shop order (SO #90022 ) on the Bill Mitchell special custom Buick built under Bill Mitchell's direction mentioned listed the following part:

"Escutcheon front door window electric lift switch - 5 button" . Also in another column for this same part it lists the part number as #43895-B, and in a subsequent column the date released was " April 5", with the latest change in another column of "B". Although this was buried in multi pages of different parts it became a reality in early 2014 that the hole in the driver's door was much too large for a typical electrical 4 gang switch. Of course that asked the question what was in the right door. A quick check discovered that the right door hole was too large for a single switch but a 2 gang switch fit!

Going through all the parts we had for this car we did find a two gang switch which fit perfectly in the right door inner. However no 5 gang switch! Calling numerous junk yards and no one of course had ever seen a 5 gang switch except for one junk yard but they could not produce one. I had assumed that if any GM car had a 5 gang switch it would have been Cadillac.

The next question was what the 5th right door switch and the 2nd right door switch operated? Consulting with retired GM Stylist, Larry Faloon, who actually worked for VP Bill Mitchell in the 1960s he suggested the extra electrical switch in each of the doors could be the powered head rests.

Another person suggested a powered vent window. However, we found no hardware that would support that and the car did come with the original vent window crank handles. There were no extra holes in the door inners for the mechanical and electrical systems for powered vent window crank handles.

Now how do we obtain a 5-gang electrical switch. Our decision simply was to construct a 5 gang switch.

We started by slicing both a 4 gang switch and a single gang switch and butting them up to each other to see if this was something we could do in our shop. The problem to mate these two parts was the original switch bezel material was a casting that we had no one with the expertise to do that type of welding. We knew Ryan DeVries has done a lot of brass castings for us so we figured he could make a casting if we handed him the parts. However after he had examined the pieces we gave him he stated that the best way was to join these parts was by a welding process that could weld this type of material. However, he wanted fresh pieces to begin the process so we went our inventory to again find another 4 gang and another single gang switch.

Roger, Ryan's employee actually did the work of mating both the two casting and then expanding the metal clip that holds the 5 gang switch into the bezel and also into the inner door upholstery piece. Roger also had to mate the two internal electrical switches into one continuous electrical switch using epoxy.

Attached photos are again work in process. The next step is removal of the chrome plating, then copper plating, finishing the metal, then the final chrome plating and polishing. The imperfections seen in the last photo will be removed during the final finishing process. We will then add that final photograph.