[dataway]

I just halted my late night work in the shop and came up here to ask some questions. I'm going to forego my usual "Experiment, destroy, fail" method of work and try an "Ask, succeed, smile" method.

I'm trying to replace the weather stripping on the vent window and these are the issues ...

1. That straight piece that has the tabs you bend over and slide in the slots ... it's straight, the place goes is not straight, the metal inside needs to be bent on the "flat" (the way it doesn't want to bend without kinking). I got the first piece on by carefully bending it a tiny bit at a time on the flat ... is that the way it's done? Obviously the factory had them made with the curve in them already.

2. See the OEM clip in the pic, that holds the slanted front piece of weather stripping into the metal channel. Looks like you are supposed to be able to clip them onto the strip, press into the channel of the window frame and the little spikies grab the inside edges of the channel. I cannot get these clips on the back side of the strip, the metal inside them is just too wide. Are people just gluing this piece in the channel?

3. The lower strip where the pivot arm goes through ... there is a track you push it into ... seems to fit in there well enough, should it be glued into it's track?

4. Does the window have to be installed simultaneously as the frame is assembled? Doesn't appear to be a way to get it into place with the frame assembled, perhaps it could be done without the actual glass installed. No biggie ... just a pain to get the stripping arranged at the same time as keeping the window in place.


Do people actually drive their cars in the rain with all the POS reproduction weather stripping out there? These pieces are the "Good" ones with the metal inside etc. Much less robust than the originals, specially the flaps that cover the glass, no where near as beefy as the originals, floppy almost like rubber casting flash.

Thanks for your patience

[OG68]

I went through this about a year ago. I had two sets of new weatherstripping (Soft Seal left by the previous owner) and Metro. I laid them out side by side against the originals and you can tell some differences.

Soft Seal has the internal metal backing, Metro doesn't.

The Metro's appearance is very close to the factory. Soft Seal is just plain rubber.

Soft Seal openings for the vent pivot and water drain are open and placement is the same as factory. Metro's openings had to be opened up and the vent pivot is off by an 1/8'. I had to enlarge the opening to make it fit right.

It would appear that the Soft Seal was the better WS but the rubber composition didn't look or feel right. I did a lot of research and the Metro brand consistently had better reviews than Soft Seal. As I didn't want to repeat the work in 3 or 4 years I chose the Metro and like you I had same issues installing them.

1. That straight piece that has the tabs you bend over and slide in the slots ... it's straight, the place goes is not straight, the metal inside needs to be bent on the "flat" (the way it doesn't want to bend without kinking). I got the first piece on by carefully bending it a tiny bit at a time on the flat ... is that the way it's done? Obviously the factory had them made with the curve in them already.

I gently bent the frame following the original contour. and then installed using a brass punch and hammer to secure the clips resulting in a good tight fit.

2. See the OEM clip in the pic, that holds the slanted front piece of weather stripping into the metal channel. Looks like you are supposed to be able to clip them onto the strip, press into the channel of the window frame and the little spikies grab the inside edges of the channel. I cannot get these clips on the back side of the strip, the metal inside them is just too wide. Are people just gluing this piece in the channel?

I did. Try as I might, I couldn't get the clips to fit over the rubber. I tried doing this with the Metro and Soft Seal rubbers. So I used the 3M ws cement

3. The lower strip where the pivot arm goes through ... there is a track you push it into ... seems to fit in there well enough, should it be glued into it's track?

I glued it. The track requires that you slide the rubber into it this helped spread the glue.

4. Does the window have to be installed simultaneously as the frame is assembled? Doesn't appear to be a way to get it into place with the frame assembled, perhaps it could be done without the actual glass installed. No biggie ... just a pain to get the stripping arranged at the same time as keeping the window in place.

Yes, you can install after the frame is assembled. Once you lined up the window, into the lower frame opening and turn it 180* out, push it down far enough so the upper pin can slide into the frame pin opening.

Do people actually drive their cars in the rain with all the POS reproduction weather stripping out there? These pieces are the "Good" ones with the metal inside etc. Much less robust than the originals, specially the flaps that cover the glass, no where near as beefy as the originals, floppy almost like rubber casting flash.

I agree, Its amazing to me how poorly made both of them are. Both don't fit the assembled frame as well as they should. I can have either a gap at the front or the rear of the frame. I chose to fit it tight against the front and fill the gap at the rear with silicon. Maybe its just me, but I don't have a rubber stretcher in my tool box.

Picture shows the gap that I needed to fill. I've since removed and replaced the stainless trim and repositioned the outer fuzzy

[dataway]

Excellent, thank you so much. I thought there was something wrong with me

Looks like I'm going to end up with a similar gap at the end.

I've still got the other side completely assembled, I'm going to play with getting that window in and out of the assembled frame a few times so I'll have it down before doing the side I'm working on.

Glad it's not just me that has problems with some of these products. Luckily the car will probably never see rain ... but it would also be nice if I didn't have any whistling or breezes blowing in

[dataway]

Weather strip is glued in. So I'm testing fitting the bolt on section of the window frame and things are kind of jammed up in the corners where the straight WS meets the triangle piece.

At a glance it looks to me like the triangle WS is supposed to be "behind" the straight piece, or maybe just meet the straight piece?

Looks like there are pockets in the triangle piece that the straight piece should fit into .... or do I just trim the ends of the straight piece?

I'm actually thinking about leaving on the OEM WS on the other side, it has some minor dry rot on the lower edge, some of which will show, but it's still pretty flexible and there seems to be way more meat for the window to seal against.