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Converting Old window seals to "new" style flush fit... tips..

8K views 5 replies 3 participants last post by  Custom Jim 
#1 ·
I have seen this before on some old 911 porsches. Pretty much the original cars of this time had a big rubber windshield gasket, with a chrome strip in the middle of the seal. As cars went on, they got a tighter fit in the windshield frame, and relied on adhesive.

On the porsches i saw, they welded a strip of metal all around the frame to get it to fit tighter and flush.

When this modification is done, im curious as to what kind of windshield gasket one uses for this "new" look?
 
#2 ·
When I flush mounted the windshield and back glass in my 73 I used staircase shaped stepped metal to bring the factory recess up and tighter to the glass, I could have just added a filler around the edge but wanted to keep the same original thickness ribbon seal on it.
To finish mine off I bought 2 rolls of window trim for a 90's style Camaro/Firebird. This trim is rubber and when viewed from the end looks like a capitol "T". The vertical portion of the "T" molding fit between the edge of the glass and the new raised channel that was now closer to the edge of the glass and the horizontal portion of the "T" layed on the glass and the body.
When I was doing the work it seems to me I used some paint sticks around the edge of the glass and the new raised channel to weld it in to give it the right amount of gap. The rubber molding has some flex in it to go around curves but on my rear glass on the sides and bottom pieces where the butted against each other I mitered the ends to make a nice fit.

You do need to measure the thickness of the glass you will be using. I mocked mine up with an original glass only to replace it afterwards with a replacement one and found out the new glass was an 1/8" thinner than the original one so what I had to do was buy a thicker ribbon seal to compensate for the thinner glass.

Jim
 
#3 ·
SUnlight deteriorates the urethane or butyl. How are you protecting
the urethane? Originally the molding blocked the sun rays, with the
new molding can you see the urethane thru the glass?
Modern flush windshields have frit to block the rays, my Nova doesn't have frit.
 
#6 · (Edited)
Nope, no pictures as I did this years ago I'm thinking around 1990 or so and never though about documenting things.

I can say that after I measured the glass and the rubber sealing tape I'm thinking the measurement was 1/2" total (1/4" thick glass/1/4" thick seal) and I took these measurements to a buddy that had a sheet metal brake and the first 90 degree bend was 1/2" from the edge then the second bend (or drop) was 1/2" and the third bend or inward lip for the seal to seat on was also 1/2". We then added another 1/2" bend to allow me to attach the inside edge of my new channel to the original channel. I'm thinking we cut 2" wide strips 40" long or so to fit in the brake and while the straight or very slightly curved area's were the easiest. On the corners I had to do some slicing out of pie shaped cuts to form it tight so I had minimal filler to add on later.
The 1/2" top portion got trimmed down to where this trimmed edge could be butt welded so to speak to the original bent down area on the roof and pillars and did not overlap.

Jim
 
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