DDK - Die Deutschen Klassiker

I need to re-skin the drivers side door. I've got a dansk replacement door skin coming from Roger Bray. Any tips and hints on this job? Your help and comments really appreciated.
Its strange, I've stripped the car back to bare metal - a little lead filling work needed here and there but basically really sound - except the o/s door which has rusted out on the bottom and up to the lower hinge area. The outer skin has also gone. I have a replacement door but having stripped that it is badly rippled and had many repairs.
Thanks
Johns
73 911T

Hi John.

Firstly before the door is removed check how it fits in the aperture: gaps even all round? Any tight spots? Once done, when removing the door, make a note of any hinge shims.

Remove all glass from the door plus the door handle and any other parts in the way. Lay it skin down on a bench. Using a mini grinder, grind any at the very edge of the old skin: literally the bit that folds over. As you grind, you will see a little heat line form, where you are about to grind through, once you see this simply grind like that all of the way around the door.

You should now be able to peel the peened part of the doorskin (to the rear) off, leaving the bottom, and sides of the skin loose (or at least ready to peel loose). Turn the door over, and grind through the welds right at the top, and the bar that goes behind the quarter light. Remove the skin, clean up the frame, repair if needed and rust-proof. Rust proof the skin wherever it meets the frame, and make sure you will be able to weld the cross bar O.K.: i.e. do you need holes for plug-welding?

Lay the new skin over the frame, and using a hammer and dolly, start to peen over the 'flap' of skin that secures it all together. BEWARE don't pull it all of the way up yet!!

Double check that the skin is lying perfectly, that the frame and skin all meet up correctly at the top, and that the quarter light bar looks O.K. If it looks all right at this stage, peen a bit further, but not all of the way.

Trial fit back on the car, with the correct shims re-fitted. If you have built an error in, you should still be able to shift the skin foward/back or twist the door back into alignment. This is where it was so important to note the original gaps: if they were fine and now are uneven you know it's something you've done. If they were poor, this could be your chance to sort it.

If everything looks fine, take the door off and finish the clamping up of the skin.

Check on car one last time, weld up the front, rear and cross braces (all on the top of the door). Finally if you are 200% sure everything is perfect, put a couple of tack welds in the bottom corners of the skin 'flaps' where they ajoin the frame: this then locks the door from twisting.

Remove once again, paint, add any sound deadening pads, cavity wax, re-fit parts, hang and enjoy.

BTW, I found that the Dansk skin that I used on my car was rippled all of the way through: not enough to fill, but needed several layers of high build primer, flatted off every three coats. When the guide coat was coming off evenly, it was ready for top coat.

Forgot to say: there are two main ways of 'crimping' over the doorskin: the first is to have the door lying sking down on the bench, and using a medium crown hammer (slight curve across it's face). You hold a (very clean!), dolly firmly against the outside of the skin directly under the point that you are working.

You carefully tap down the rear of the skin in stages: the important thing is not to stretch the metal (hence the stages), I usually go up and down each section 5-6 times. The crowned hammer is important as a flat hammer will put little wrinkles on the face of the skin where it runs vertically on the car (being curved).

The alternative is to use a door skin tool. These are special nylon covered pliers that crimp the skin over for you. They are the work of the devil as you happily go around crimping, only to find that they have left little dents all around the front of the skin: avoid. I've got a very good pair of Sykes ones, and even they leave blemishes.

HTH

Thats great advice from Barry..worth loads!

The key thing as he says is to avaoid dents..quite hard in fact to avaoid..and to go veeery slowly truning over the edges.

I have actually used a long pievce of smoothe wood witha cloth pad on it as the dolly, and a bit of wood about 6 inches long to keep the bend strightish..and go very gradually to avoid stretching the flange..

In the end, you will either find it incredibly easy and quick ( if you have a good door and good skin..probably only available for m Porsche), or would have been much easier to repair the old skin, or get another door!

Modern techniques also invlove some glue..which is good to avoid rust..I have not used this yet..

Kind regards
David

Yes I've just back from another Contour course, and we had a brief look at glue technology: really amazing, might try it with the next cheapy restoartion just to see. Suffice to say there was no difference in strength between the swaged jointed skins that were either 100% glued or spot welded every 20mm or so.

As you say, David, no rust issues as the void is filled, unlike lapped welded joints.

Thats good advice there,Ive always found the possiblity of the door twisting to be the nightmare problem,fit it,check it and do it again!
356 Door's are very weak when the skins are removed,and can be a real pain.
For tapping the edge's over I use a very large surface plate,that the door almost fits on!

Off to a good start! Door skin arrived fro Roger Bray and looks very good - no dents or buckles. Thanks to all for the superb advice!!
Will keep you posted
Regards
John