4S side skirt question

[SteveTTT]

My 2002 4S has quite bad cracking at the rear ends of both side skirts, presumably from careless use of a trolley jack in the past - I must have had my eyes shut when I bought it! I’m planning to remove the skirts and try pu welding from the rear using a soldering iron, and then appropriate filler to tidy the outside. Here’s my question. Should the end cap - ie the vertical face, above the rubber lip and below the wheel arch liner - be completely closed off, or should there be some sort of drainage hole? Both skirts have irregularly-shaped holes in similar places, almost as if someone went in there with a screwdriver! Apologies the picture doesn’t show this very well, I’ve ringed the area where the hole in question is, above the very obvious breaks revealed when I removed the rubber lip. If any 996 4S or Turbo owners could have a quick look at their side skirts I’d really appreciate it!

[B3-CPO]

I've installed the GT3 side skirts on my last 996 and normally the wheel well covers the side skirts. Those three holes is where a rubber air dam should mount. Is that what you're talking about?

[SteveTTT]

20 hours ago, b3freak said:

I've installed the GT3 side skirts on my last 996 and normally the wheel well covers the side skirts. Those three holes is where a rubber air dam should mount. Is that what you're talking about?

Thanks for the response. I’ve removed the rubber lip (it practically fell off) so I know about those holes. The hole in question is above the lip, inside the wheel arch but below where the liner stops on the 4S. I’ll try to get a better picture. I’m pretty sure it’s impact damage that’s created the hole, as it’s quite badly split underneath the rear end of the skirt as well - maybe it was kerb damage.

[B3-CPO]

Well, it definitely looks busted up. The C4S/Turbo side skirts are terribly expensive. You might find replacing it would be the best course of action. I can confirm that my factory side skirt did not have the gap that is highlighting in your picture. 

[SteveTTT]

3 hours ago, b3freak said:

Well, it definitely looks busted up. The C4S/Turbo side skirts are terribly expensive. You might find replacing it would be the best course of action. I can confirm that my factory side skirt did not have the gap that is highlighting in your picture. 

Thanks for the confirmation, you're dead right about the cost of replacement. Here in the UK its about £1300 for the two skirts (a different price for l/h and r/h!), somewhat cheaper for grp aftermarket kit, but I think that will have to be a last resort. I haven't looked for any secondhand items yet but I'm going to get the broken ones off the car and try plastic welding them from the rear, using a soldering iron (there's some useful stuff on YouTube) then use plastic bumper filler to tidy the outside. I know there are professional 3M patching kits available if that proves necessary. Might post some pics if the welding works! Thanks for your help.

[B3-CPO]

This guy is selling a bunch that look to be in good shape. He has it listed as a "Carrera" rock molding, but I crossed referenced the part number and Porsche said it was for the wide body 996 cars -i.e. Turbo and C4S.

 

https://www.ebay.com/itm/PORSCHE-CARRERA-911-ROCKER-MOLDING-RIGHT-2001-2002-2003-2004-2005-996-504-364-00/223145709750?_trkparms=aid%3D111001%26algo%3DREC.SEED%26ao%3D1%26asc%3D20160908105057%26meid%3D1da97e065a7141f29b5d917a610cd53c%26pid%3D100675%26rk%3D2%26rkt%3D15%26sd%3D323592899459%26itm%3D223145709750&_trksid=p2481888.c100675.m4236&_trkparms=pageci%3A64ce2915-ff02-11e8-9e15-74dbd180a887|parentrq%3Aa8c3692a1670ab4527d95a22fff667c1|iid%3A1

 

[Loren]

C4S is a wide body and it is going to need Turbo sideskirts.

[SteveTTT]

45 minutes ago, b3freak said:

This guy is selling a bunch that look to be in good shape. He has it listed as a "Carrera" rock molding, but I crossed referenced the part number and Porsche said it was for the wide body 996 cars -i.e. Turbo and C4S.

 

https://www.ebay.com/itm/PORSCHE-CARRERA-911-ROCKER-MOLDING-RIGHT-2001-2002-2003-2004-2005-996-504-364-00/223145709750?_trkparms=aid%3D111001%26algo%3DREC.SEED%26ao%3D1%26asc%3D20160908105057%26meid%3D1da97e065a7141f29b5d917a610cd53c%26pid%3D100675%26rk%3D2%26rkt%3D15%26sd%3D323592899459%26itm%3D223145709750&_trksid=p2481888.c100675.m4236&_trkparms=pageci%3A64ce2915-ff02-11e8-9e15-74dbd180a887|parentrq%3Aa8c3692a1670ab4527d95a22fff667c1|iid%3A1

 

Hey thanks so much. The pictures also confirm what the unbroken mouldings look like. Even with shipping to the UK that comes out at only $200 or thereabouts, so it’s a realistic solution if I can’t fix mine or find a salvage part in the UK. You’ve been a real help, cheers! 

[SteveTTT]

31 minutes ago, Loren said:

C4S is a wide body and it is going to need Turbo sideskirts.

Thanks Lorem I’m with you on that. b3freak found the correct item. 

[SteveTTT]

On 12/11/2018 at 8:24 AM, SteveTTT said:

My 2002 4S has quite bad cracking at the rear ends of both side skirts, presumably from careless use of a trolley jack in the past - I must have had my eyes shut when I bought it! I’m planning to remove the skirts and try pu welding from the rear using a soldering iron, and then appropriate filler to tidy the outside. Here’s my question. Should the end cap - ie the vertical face, above the rubber lip and below the wheel arch liner - be completely closed off, or should there be some sort of drainage hole? Both skirts have irregularly-shaped holes in similar places, almost as if someone went in there with a screwdriver! Apologies the picture doesn’t show this very well, I’ve ringed the area where the hole in question is, above the very obvious breaks revealed when I removed the rubber lip. If any 996 4S or Turbo owners could have a quick look at their side skirts I’d really appreciate it!

 

UPDATE, 27 Jan. So I’ve now sorted the problem, reasonably successfully, with a bit of YouTube help, and I thought it might be of interest to show how I made the fix. I forgot to photograph the right hand side repair, so the pictures below are of the left sill cover which had smaller holes inside the wheelarch but a section completely broken off (only held on by the rubber lip).

Using a 40w soldering iron, and working gently on the inside face of the p.u. moulding I found it quite easy to stitch the splits together. 

I successfully reattached the broken piece, firstly welding on unstressed areas (as in the photo below) before using a small g-cramp to align the split sections.

Using offcuts of an old undertray I then welded a patch on the inside of the hole.

I then fitted filler pieces on the outside face to create the necessary curves, and filled the gaps using black cable ties as filler rods. The shaft of the soldering iron was hot enough to use as a smoothing iron to blend the external faces of the patch repairs. I also stitched and blended in the outside face of the splits, once everything was whole again.

 

The actual repairs took took me about 40 minutes per side, working quite slowly and avoiding breathing in any vapour from the polyurethane (which can contain cyanide apparently). To understand how the side skirts were fixed I had removed both wheels and wheelarch liners on the right hand side. Reinstalling these took more time than all the other repair work - there must be a knack that I don’t possess. I did the left side just by removing the rear wheel, there was sufficient access to loosen the fixings without removing the liners.

The results won’t win any beauty contests, but are not really visible, and since the car is no concours queen I can live with the aesthetics. I’ve got a strong serviceable fix that has cost me literally nothing. I did buy new speed nuts, clips and torx head screws for the wheelarch and chassis fixings, but the old parts could have been reused. Job done!