DDK - Die Deutschen Klassiker

Went to the garage last week and noticed a small tear in the new rubber seal (the expensive one that goes across the windscreen and down the sides ). Was a bit concerned to say the least, was going to take a pic of it and send it to MM, went out to the garage today and it's now completely torn into 2 seperate pieces





Has anyone else experienced anything quite like this??? It's like the sort of tear you see when you pull an elastic band apart with too much force and it breaks/tears. I haven't installed the roof yet so it's nothing rubbing on it. I installed it without any problems at all. The rest of it seems like new still. Very strange....

Sent a mail off to MM with pics, hopefully they'll come good and replace but it's always a worry when you don't know what the seller is going to do in these situations.

Very odd, it's almost as if the rubber seal is too small to fit. If that was the case then it I guess it would be over tensioned and any small split in the rubber would soon end up in failure as you have.

Tom - It was a bit of a stretch to get it to go onto the top of the windscreen bit but I thought that was normal (not having installed any of these seals before). In fact you can see how much I had to stretch it by, as now it's torn apart it resumed a natural position and the gap between the 2 pieces shows how much I had to stretch it by. What you described is exactly what seems to have happened.

Have heard nothing back from MM yet following the mail I sent them yesterday. If I hear nothing by tomorrow afternoon I'll give them a call.

I've now got to the bottom of this. Spoke to many retailers including Pelican, ForestFine and of course MM. There has apparently been a quality issue with this part in that the bond between the 3 strips of rubber seal (i.e. top of window bit and the 2 bits that go down the sides) has been known to fail. This is exactly what happened to mine and is why MM have no problem replacing the part. The problem is that no-one has this part in stock MM, Pelican and FF all are out of stock. MM said they've had it on back order for 3 months and don't expect anything till possibly July (which you know will be September). Now I have a car ready for the summer but no main windscreen to roof seal, so I can't put the roof on . I asked MM to at least send my broken seal back so I can at least install the roof, but they said they've already sent it back to the manufacturer.

Has anyone got a decent secondhand one I can borrow until MM send me the replacement new one at the end of the summer? Pppleeeaase

I feel your pain Moggy. I've ordered one from FF and they've given me the same story...hope it won't be september as i wanted to take mine to le mans classic (bit hard if the top is rattling)...spose i could go topless

moggy wrote: Has anyone got a decent secondhand one I can borrow until MM send me the replacement new one at the end of the summer? Pppleeeaase

If you can contact Kevin (ponytail) Clarke, he may just possibly have a second hand one. I gave him a huge box of various rubber seals at the 914 International in Essen last year, and I am sure there was one there at that time. If you don't know him personally, I suggest you try through Bruce Manning or Tom Loder, as he doesn't do email or Internet.

if this helps:
as the rubber is approx 2 inch 'short'...............
cut a 2 inch section from a 2nd hand one and glue it with superglue in the gap. I have shortened a few rubbers in my time doing roof chops and they have yet to split using this method !!
You could glue up the split, and put the section in the very middle so it doesnt look too ugly.
Dan

Rustbusket said :

I have shortened a few rubbers in my time

Is this some form of inverse bragging?

Hello, Moggy.

I have a brand new one..OEM from Porsche.

Pm me ..

Kind regards
David

roger wrote:Rustbusket said :

I have shortened a few rubbers in my time

Is this some form of inverse bragging?

and I thought it was Cubist with the perve humour !!!!

Nope - there's lots of us out here!