Stainless sill install

[gbonifie]

What a great weekend this has been. All caught up on my chores around the house and my wife was at a four day convention in San Francisco. So I was able to spend 2 whole days working on the 911. Mostly cosmetic stuff that I had been putting off, but I also installed a set of stainless sill plates in place of the 17 year old shrunken and peeling away standard issue.

I ordered the sill plates from Pelican on Monday and received them on Thursday. Kind of a fringe benefit of living just down the coast from Pelican is that I get 2 day shipping for the price of ground.

I had been worried about the old sill plates because they seem to trap a lot of water, but my paint is in good shape so I thought it most likely wasn't necessary to replace them. I just liked the aesthetics of the stainless plates.

I started out with the passenger side and carefully peeled off the old black sill plate. I was surprised to discover lots of dime-sized bubbles in the glue that were full of water. I had washed the car last weekend and there was still water trapped under the sill plate. About 50% of the glue (goo) came off on the back of the plate, and the remainder was fairly easy to just roll up by rubbing it with my hand. I used Meguiars Extra cleaner to soften up the few tough, sticky spots that were left.

Not too bad. The driver's side should be the same, right?

I peeled off the driver side sill plate and this time about 90% of the glue stuck to the car. Like the passenger side, lots of trapped water in the glue bubbles and one of the bubbles, about the size of a quarter, was guards red. Not good! A big chunk of the paint came up with the glue -- actually paint and primer all the way to the bare metal. So now this nice little two hour project ended up spanning two days so I could properly prime and touch up the bad spot. Since more of the glue stuck to the car, it took a little longer to clean up the sill, but the same procedure above worked like a charm.

I then waxed up the sills to get to get them nice and clean. I used some wax stripper to remove the wax on the horizontal surface of the sill to maximize adhesion of the double-sided tape on the backs of the new plates. Then on to dry fitting the new plates. The first thing you notice is that the plates are razor straight -- the sill of a 911 is not.

The only thing that bothered me about the fit is that the rear outer edge seemed to stick out too far. I've noticed this in several pictures of the stainless sills but never really thought about it. The combination of the bevel on the inner edge of the stainless plates and the metal work in the corresponding location in the sill prevents the plate from fitting flush. A few minutes with a metal file allowed me to remove the inner corner from the rear of the new plate and this adjustment improved the fit quite a bit. The filed off corner is invisible since it rests under the weather stripping that surrounds the door opening.

As I was filing away on the sill plate, it struck me that the pair cost $269 and there was no sending them back now.

After making a mental note of the best possible fit, I peeled off the film from the double-sided tape and slid the inner edge of the new plate under the weather stripping, being carful to keep the plate at an angle so the tape did not stick. Once the plate is in the right place, just press down to engage the tape. The tape really sticks! I'm sure the plate would look like a boomerang if you tried to remove it at this point. I went through the dry fitting process several times.

The final result looks like this:




Of course all this hard work made me thirsty, so I hopped in the car to go get a cold drink. Wouldn't you know it, I had to go all the way to San Simeon (80 mile round trip) to find what I was looking for.





Life is good!

[jazzbass]

Very nice! There is ALWAYS more to these projects than you think.

[ViRu1220]

that picture really makes me not want to go to work tomorrow.......
my wife sent me out for some papertowels a couple of weeks ago, i came back 2 hours later without the paper towels. hehehehe i totally forgot and had to go back to get them and i was only gone 10 mins.

frank

[niner11]

Good looking car, welcome aboard

[azasadny]

Gary,

Nice work, beautiful car!

[Bob's Flat-Six]

Those look Great, and I love the interior color, What is it and post a pic of the insides, Please

And I wish I could have joined you for the cool drink.
I love that cove below the Castle, it's one of my favorite spots.

[azasadny]

Gary,

Don't let your passenger sit on your glasses!

[sfmlaw17]

Looks great. I love the stainless on the red. I believe that I found my next project...

[gbonifie]

Thanks for the feedback guys. Bob, the interior color is mahogany which I thought was kind of a strange combination with guards red when I got the car. It has really grown on me though. Here's a better picture of the interior (with the old sills):