Rarely Seen: LE Spoiler Braces, NOS Porsche, NLA Options

[914Sixer]

Thought I would show these because they are rarely seen, Fit on the front suspension point and attach to lower lip of FACTORY LE spoiler.

[technicalninja]

My father, who was a bad assed pilot and an industrial designer who loves fiberglass made many, many, fiberglass / ABS modifications for cars.

He built the very first "Porsche Panels" for the 914. These are the vacuum formed plastic rocker panels that are flared on the ends and have the raised letters. Auto Atlanta is the source of these today. Originally Green Oaks Porsche Audi sold the molds and the rights to Volkswagen of North America.

I have been involved with most of his projects and have seen MOST of the ways FRP products can fail.

I am NOT a fan of fiberglass shit but have a pretty good idea on how to make stuff last as long as it is possible.

If I was making a spoiler today I'd want a different plastic than glass. Urethane is much better regarding cracks but it shrinks/warps with age.
The FRP material that the Fieros/early Saturn body pieces were made out of is the best material for car body parts IMO. I have a buddy who is the president of the North Texas Fiero club and I see Fieros quite often. At 40 years the Fiero plastic is problematic as well, but it lasts 3 times longer than straight up fiberglass

Fiberglass is easy to use/mold and manufacture, but it is very prone to NVH damage/cracks.
Worked into sheet metal with bondo it will NEVER last. It always cracks/delaminates.
We have a 916 clone that is all fiberglass and at least the fender flairs will go steel.
A bolt on/dzus fastener attachment is best, but the mounting points need a little bit of "give" or you will quickly see cracks form around them.

Making an LE spoiler out of glass I'd want a composite honeycomb spine through it and I'd want the attachment points all slightly "floating" so that it was both rigid and had a tiny bit of wiggle in them. On a forward-facing spoiler I'd want a mounting point every 12".
Another way that works kick ass is to have a "guide bar" that is rigid and rubber coated (heater hose works great) and not quite touching the spoiler. This puppy would be 1/8" away from the back side of the glass so that the only time it comes into play is above 75 mph. It would let the spoiler bend just a little tiny bit before it went solid.

Properly braced this set up would allow you to hit a raccoon at 50mph and not lose the spoiler.

Mount fiberglass solidly on a car that can bend (they all do a tiny little bit) and sooner or later it will crack/fail close to the mounting point.

The first picture in this thread shows this.

I bought a nice fresh LE reproduction from Mark and even with my anal/OCD tendencies I DO NOT believe it will stray crack free for a decade.