Beetle Popouts
Posted: Mon May 17, 2010 4:54 pm
I managed to pick up a pair of popout rear windows for Petrus from a Beetle Graveyard the other day.
All the hardware were intact, but the rubbers were shot and the brightware looked a bit "rof en dof".
This afternoon, I started on one window to replace the rubber and try and spruce it up generally before installing it.
The rubbers were so hard that I ended up cutting them and pulling the remnants from the channel


With the rubber removed, I decided to try an polish the aluminium frame. Elbow grease ended up being too tedious, so the trusty Dremel with buffing wheel stepped up to the plate.

The window clip showed the most improvement (It gets MOER hot under the buffing wheel; so be careful)
Before
After

All the previous overspray as well as quite a few years' worth of gunk was removed.
The window is now refurbished and waiting for installation (Thanks Callooker for supplying the rubber. It was well worth the wait)

One done, one to go and then its time to install them
The glass was fairly badly scratched, and as a last resort I polished the glass using the Autglym metal polish and the Dremel. Only the very deep scratches remained, but they are no longer so obvious.
All the hardware were intact, but the rubbers were shot and the brightware looked a bit "rof en dof".
This afternoon, I started on one window to replace the rubber and try and spruce it up generally before installing it.
The rubbers were so hard that I ended up cutting them and pulling the remnants from the channel


With the rubber removed, I decided to try an polish the aluminium frame. Elbow grease ended up being too tedious, so the trusty Dremel with buffing wheel stepped up to the plate.

The window clip showed the most improvement (It gets MOER hot under the buffing wheel; so be careful)
Before
After

All the previous overspray as well as quite a few years' worth of gunk was removed.
The window is now refurbished and waiting for installation (Thanks Callooker for supplying the rubber. It was well worth the wait)

One done, one to go and then its time to install them
The glass was fairly badly scratched, and as a last resort I polished the glass using the Autglym metal polish and the Dremel. Only the very deep scratches remained, but they are no longer so obvious.