LWB Horn Grill Fit - The Devil is in the Details

[jluetjen]

During my car's recent repaint both front fenders were replaced using Dansk replacements. The bodywork guy commented that they fit great -- but none of the holes lined up. I noticed the same thing when fitting the headlight hardware. That problem was eventually resolved by some judicious use of the Moto tool to enlarge the some of the holes on the bucket hardware.

Continuing to work on the front end, moved to what I expected to be the very straight forward horn grills. Ugh!!!! The right side grill seems to fit great, and aligns well with the adjacent directional bucket and the fender-hood separation line.



The left side grill on the other hand had over a 1/4" gap to the adjacent directional!


It looks like the bulkhead that separates the two bays are is angled in at the bottom, and also slightly twisted compared to the same piece on the right, which results in the horn grill being pushed too far towards the center. Note to self -- we should have trial-fitted EVERY PIECE of hardware before the panels were painted. It looks like it will be solvable to an acceptable degree by grinding off some of the "twist" at the bottom (UGH!!! My new, immaculate paint job!) and then I'll have to touch it up.

Doing a quick survey of some 911 magazines that I have, (Classic Porsche, Excellence, Pano, etc. ) I noticed that a lot of cars seem to have irregular gaps between the horn grill and the directional on the left side of the car, when compared to the right side.

Has anyone else ever noticed this? Is this a common fault or just some natural manufacturing variation in the panels that I got?

[tdw28210]

Ive spent hours on the same issue. And yeah, the gaps are all over the board. But I have seen some that look symmetrical and nice. Rare though.

[Soterik]

Note that the most common reproduction horn grills for the LWB cars are not the same dimension as the originals, they are 3 to 5mm "shorter" (not as wide) as the originals.

[78-911SC]

Running into the same problem. I'm testing before paint and my margins are perfect on the trunk lid but when you get to the horn grills its way off. Has anyone done any type of modifications to metal fenders or trunk lid to make them fit. Any suggestions?

[Jonny042]

I had to cut and re-weld both of my "Genuine" Porsche fenders (the part where your finger is pointing needed relocation) and also enlarge the mounting holes.

I don't even want to think about how many hours I have spent farting around trying to get various combinations of parts to fit perfectly. Getting everything to line up in 3 dimensions is pretty tough - the fender, hood, bumper, bumper seal, bumper seal lip on the front bulkhead, turn signal, turn signal lens, and horn grille, all need to be in the right spot in relation to each other. Move one thing and it affects 4 others. It's really frustrating.



My car is 100% brand new from the suspension pan forward and it's still my biggest challenge. I am getting close, but you are right - start paying attention to this one spot on every car you see, and you'll spot some less than impressive results, even on restorations of million dollar 73 RS's.

Also, I bought Horn Grilles from Auto Foreign Services and they are lovely, and fit properly. Now if I could only find turn signal gaskets that were even remotely close to usable. Everything I can find are oversized and spongy.

[Jonny042]

PS - jluetjen, checked out your other thread about the repaint. Car will be worth all the trouble when it's done, and great colour choice!!

And ps - your body guy should be able to adjust by cutting and a bit of welding on the bulkhead between the signal light and horn grille, or like you say maybe a bit of grinding will do it, without affecting the paint that will be visible when all is said and done- a bit of satin black in the areas visible through the horn grill is "correct" and could be used to touch up the area.

How well does the fender line up with the door? Mine required quite a bit of work in that area too. The factory used quite a bit of lead to make things fit on some of these parts!

[jluetjen]

Yeah, my body guy recommended the satin-black "fix" too. Emotionally, I'm not quite there yet.

[jluetjen]

Originally Posted by Jonny042

How well does the fender line up with the door? Mine required quite a bit of work in that area too. The factory used quite a bit of lead to make things fit on some of these parts!

Do you mean this area? This is the passenger side door. The driver's side door is currently up against the wall and not easy to access right now.

[RSTarga]

These were hand built cars. Ferraris of the era are not even symetrical side to side.
Lots of hand fitting and lead.
No robots here.

[Jonny042]

That looks pretty good - carry on!

Originally Posted by jluetjen

Do you mean this area? This is the passenger side door. The driver's side door is currently up against the wall and not easy to access right now.

[jluetjen]

Jimmy does good work!

[RSTarga]

Originally Posted by jluetjen

Do you mean this area? This is the passenger side door. The driver's side door is currently up against the wall and not easy to access right now.

That gap is a bit wide.

[jluetjen]

Perfect for my application. I'm not building a concourse winner or a garage queen. It will be a 3-season driver. Something that I can enjoy and hopefully not worry too much about.

[Jonny042]

Originally Posted by RSTarga

That gap is a bit wide.

It's also a bit late to do anything about it now! Besides there's a good chance that holding things to that sort of standard would add an extra 0 to the cost of the paintwork.

[Jonny042]

Originally Posted by jluetjen

Perfect for my application. I'm not building a concourse winner or a garage queen. It will be a 9-season driver. Something that I can enjoy and hopefully not worry too much about.

Good for you! Look forward to seeing some final shots of the car. Maybe even with some paint chips and bugs

[dhamilto]

Just to help others who come across the issue of a badly placed horn grille and indicator light mounting bracket.

Here is the relatively easy fix that I did on a new OEM left fender. The other side was borderline OK, about 2mm too tight but might be OK with tap of the hammer, we'll see.

The left bracket was about 10mm away from the horn grille, so there was a big gap between the horn grille and indicator lamp. Looking from the front of the car, the offending bracket sloped up and to the right (like this / ), whereas it was relatively vertical on the opposite fender, and my original fenders.

The solution was to detach the top of the bracket (with die grinder and 3-inch cutting wheel) and correct the slope, as shown near the top of the picture. Unfortunately, the bracket would not bend into the required new location without removing the bottom rear bracket attachment (shown at bottom of pic).

This mod probably took less than an hour of extremely careful (mostly die) grinding and worked a treat.

Pity the OEM fenders are thrown together so badly, I don't know how they get them this bad !!

Hope this helps somebody...