Door Rubber Revisited

[velotech]

My issue is the same one submitted some time back by Andrew in this post (without a good resolution):

Question; Is the top inner door seal on a 62 FHC the same as the seal that goes around the quarter light? I have a channel riveted to the body that goes all the way from the bottom corner of the Quarter light and right around under the rain gutter down to the front bottom of the windscreen pillar. The seals I bought from SNG have the A post rubber integral to this seal and it only goes as far as the QL hinge pillar. It is a totally different extrusion to the rear quarter light and being light and spongy will not grip in the channel. I note in the parts book that the A post seal is a separate seal to the seal that fits in this riveted on channel. My thought is that the SNG seal is for a later car, perhaps a series 2, it has a U section around the door aperture where as the other seal is a flat slightly taper seal which works very well on the QL so should seal the door as well. Therefore if this is correct I would have to cut the A post seal off at the waist/bottom of windscreen pillar.

So his situation (and mine) was that he could only find replacement door seals that integrated the lower door seal with part of the door window frame seal that runs up the A pillar and ends at the B pillar. This is clearly different than what is shown in the parts catalog where the lower door seal ends at the base of the A pillar and the quarter light or cantrail seal extends all the way around the quarter window, across the top of the door and ends at the base of the A pillar.

If someone makes the correct seal arrangement for the S1 FHC cars, I can't find it. What are the more anal owners doing to replicate the original seals? I suppose I could look for a longer (and more correct shape) quarter light seal than I have and cut the upper portion of the combination door lower seal off, but it's hard to believe that this hasn't been better addressed before. I apologize if it has in another post that I couldn't find.

Thanks,
Rory
.

[PeterCrespin]

Just buy the one-piece later seal. See the 4.2 book. It's what they use even on OTS these days and you just trim it. The fewer joints the better so go from A to B pillar in one go. Not difficult, not an issue.

As for 'anal' - cut it in half and then stick it back together again. Bingo, just like the original.

[velotech]

It seems I might have to do just what you suggest: buy the later one piece door seal and cut it at the base of the A post. The section of this later seal that extends over the door window is not only very different looking than the original, but its foot is too wide to fit into the retaining channel. I've twice ordered what should have been the correct BD18559 front door seal, but in both cases the suppliers supersede it to the later BD25716 seal. Sigh.

Something seems wrong with the part of this one piece seal that goes in front of the door, however. The seal's cross section is basically a U shape, with one of the legs of the U noticeably longer than the other. The seal which I took off the car (which I believe to be original from '63) has the longer of the two legs inboard with the shorter leg on the door side. The replacement seal has this reversed, with the taller leg on the door side. So instead of having potentially both legs sealing against the door, you would have only the longer leg contact the door and fold over the shorter leg.

It's the same situation with the seal on the other side, and a similar seal from a different source, so I'm clearly missing something here. Any insight on this?

Thanks,
Rory

[velotech]

I could still use some help with this door seal question. The photos below show what I think is the original seal on the car and a section of it removed. The longer of its U shaped profile legs is definitely against the body, the shorter leg against the door. Every replacement seal I have tried has the length of the legs reversed. Not only is this different from what I removed, but it doesn't cover the area on the body side which was previously covered by the longer leg, such that you would want to paint that section, which I want to avoid. Am I the only one out there with this issue?

Thanks,
Rory

Edit: I didn't realize that I was unable to attach photos directly to my post. If you really want to see my car's door seal it is the first blue/red FHC in the 3.8 Factory Fit section of the forum 887530.[/img]