DDK - Die Deutschen Klassiker

Hi All,

A quick question on floor pans for a RHD 79' (911). I can see there are 4 main options for manufacturer :

• Dansk
  Restoration Design
  Retroline
  Porsche

I am not actually going to fit a full pan, Its more the sides where the sills have eaten further into the pan, and I will cut a new pan as needed.

In any case I can see i have the option of either

• Half (left and right)
  Sides
  Top and bottom

Can I ask any experience on fit of the above? Or are they all much the same with this panel?

P.S. Dansk outer sills VS genuine Porsche. I already have a pair of Dansk outer sills, I read somewhere the genuine panels are better for the outer sill. Any thoughts? Should i sell the Dansk, and get the gen P, or just stick with the Dansk? Alternatively RD?

Luke

I’ve only fitted one floor so can’t compare, but I do know the Restoration design front and rear halves were spot on. I fitted the whole thing welded together in one piece.

As for outer sills I bought the RD panels to start with and then bought the OE panels (and kidney bowls) on Barry’s advice and they were a much crisper pressing that required less work to fit/paint prep hence paid for themselves.

I used the RD inner sills as that’s just a flat panel and they were fine.

I used the Retro Line front and back halves and got a decent end-result. The worst aspect of the panels was the green paint, which fell off anywhere the panels were stressed. Sanding off the entire floor top and bottom contributed to one of my neighbours attacking me over the noise!

There were some careless inaccuracies in the pressing, mostly just the positions of the side flanges on the rear panel. I flattened off one side and repositioned it. If I did the job over again I'd have taken more care to do so in a way that lined up the front and rear pressings. Then the tunnel and inner sills would have lined up a bit better on the upper levels of the floor that they fit to, but it's not so far off that anybody will notice. I jacked a dolly up under the floor and reshaped a couple of the stampings with a pneumatic hammer to line up the front and back, which took about half an hour, but I think this wouldn't have been necessary if I'd repositioned the side flanges more carefully.

All the flanges were way too big, which left spare metal to cut off and the rear I folded up after welding.

Moving the flange probably only added a couple of hours to the job. The whole job took about a week or maybe two, with the two major components of the job being rebuilding the corroded inner sill and centre tunnel flanges where they meet the floor, and seam-welding the two panels I used to the front left corner which didn't need replacing.

Sent from my SM-G988B using Tapatalk

Not sure my experiences are relevant...

I made my own side 'strips' to fix the floor sides on my '73 coupe.
There were no parts available when I did mine.

I used Dansk outer/inner sills back then too and the outers were awful, as Gary said, pressings that had poor creases/folds and some odd shaping.

I also used Dansk door skins that were a nightmare.
Porsche rear wings dropped into place with zero issues.
Dansk front wings recently where better than i thought, but not a patch on original wing shapes around the vertical leading edge of the doors.

If i were you I would follow Gary's advice.

I've recently fitted the forward section floor pan from Restoration Design. It was spot on and is decent quality.

thanks for the replies, really helpful to actually have a Dansk, RD, and Retroline experience! Based on the above, I will go for the restoration design items for the floor pan pieces. For the sills I was already leaning towards the OE outers, so that seals it. That said I will try the dansk ones I already have for fit just to gain an idea, before pulling the trigger on OE. They came with the car, so nothing lost.

We have a restoration design front floor pan section in stock. £190 save on shipping & duty.

If you need large sections, and want it to look original once done, I would advise steering clear of Retroline - the pressings only roughly resemble the originals (height, shape, sharpness are way off but can be improved with work of course). Useful if you just need small patches though.

I think you have to look at the big picture (which parts definitely and ideally need replacing) and decide which option gives you the lowest labour cost, as the panels cost a small fraction of that unless you plump for a complete floor section...

Thanks for the extra info all. By all accounts the Restoration Design does seem to be a no-brainer. I will be sure to heed the advice. I am not yet at the point where I am going to pull the trigger, but either way as you say its a small cost, so might as well buy the best.