Pat,
Were would this be going? I would only consider a trade. I would have to think about that.

Trade for what? I'm open!

Pat

Plastic never ages well. Think of it a a bowl of spaghetti. Plastic molecules are chains of varying lengths. When moulded, they get stretched. As they age, they tend to contract. They accept almost every opportunity to separate.
Some plastics like nylon are condensation types that produce entrained water when they polymerize. The nylon is strong when 'wet' and fractures when 'dry'. Stick your nylon ice scraper in hot water for an hour before scraping ice and see how much more resistant to cracking it is.

Unfortunately a plastic 914 part is like a 356 crankshaft, it is not a matter of IF it will break, only a matter of WHEN.

So, Dave,

Are you saying that my almost 3 year search for a "proper" rain tray is a lost cause? I should give it up?

Never! "Remember when the Germans bombed Pearl Harbor - did we give up then?" Animal House!

I almost got one last month, but the owner decided to keep it for some restoration in the future.

If Garland needs/wants something I have or can get, I'll grab his tray (if he parts with it), take it to Charlotte next year & do my best. I won't consider my 914 whole until I have a perfect one - or near perfect. My original cannot even be mounted. I do have a perfect later style, but it's later style. Important to me!
Pat

Never a lost cause. However, when you get one, you will have to do a super treatment on it to be able to preserve it for any length of time. Really, I think the best thing is to reproduce them somehow. Plastic and rubber parts just do not last. They don't rust like steel, but they have their own forms of decay.

At this point, I'd have to say it worth at least the cost of having your white car de-rusted and painted.....

Or you can be evil like me and do a live webcast of you cutting it up

Uncle George at AA mentioned he had a source for remaking them, but I don't see how there could be enough demand to warrant the cost.

Pity. From what I hear, the later style trays are being redone by Perf Prod, but I also hear that the quality is bad.

This is the first time I've read this thread....... plastics such as the rain tray are done by injection molding. The plastic is heated and forced into a mold under preassure. Water then runs thru the mold and cools the plastic and the two parts of the mold come apart leaving you with the finished product.

To develop a mold to make new ones would cost about $20K (I had a buddy that worked at a local injection molding place)....that is if you were going to make them in any volume....such as producing 100,000 or so for a producton run of cars (why Porsche changed them after one or two years worth of production run I don't know). That would make the mold development per piece about $5 per. Pretty cheap in the cost of a $4,000 car.

I could make them, but the mold development cost would be around $3000 (that's estimated...might be higher) and if I had a perfect one to use as a pattern. What the final cost per piece would be depends on how much of a demand there is for them.

It's always the first one that costs the most.

Thats my point. If every 914, thru sometime late on '72 (I think that's when they changed) wanted one, it would be OK - that's about 40K 914's. Assuming the tray was made properly (& that a donor was available), the cost would be moderate. But, since there are probably less than 5K of these cars left in usable condition (excluding sixes, which didn't have it), the cost would be prohibitative.

What would I pay for one? Probably about $300. But that's me. I doubt that anyone else would have the slightest interest. I'm a little anal about this part - most are not.

What bothers me is that I know of two out there that are right. And I can't get my hands on either.
Pat

If there are two guys out there that have the part and won't sell it to you for $300 then they need to have their head examined even more than you!

I'll check my local resource again next week, and if I find one, I'll cut you a deal at $200

Ferg

You think I'm kidding? Show me the part.

But it had better be perfect. other than a little dust.

Money waiting! Don't let me down - every one else has for 3 years!
Pat

When my ex bro-in-law had his body shop he talked about buying a plastic welder kit......it was suppost to able to fix any type of plastic on a car.....I'll ask him about it and if he bought it.

I haven't checked the one on the 72 I just bought.......let you know in the spring what shape it's in

only ten bucks , 19 hours to go
http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/ws/eBayISAP...061383&rd=1

e-mail the seller - had cracks in it! I have several of these already!

Thanks for being on the lookout for me though.
Pat

A body shop that I used to work at had a plastic welder, before the repair epoxies were as good as they are now. It was basically an electric soldering iron with a shoe shaped like a regular household iron, but it was only 1" long and 1/2" wide. It had a hole in the middle with a small tube brazed to the shoe for adding material to the middle of the heated area. It came with little sticks of plastic- PP, PE, Urethane, etc., like you get with a hot glue gun, but only 4-5mm dia. We would spray it with Pam so that the plastic wouldn't stick to the shoe.
We fixed a lot of plastic bumpers with that thing.
I had an Ultratorch, a butane soldering iron, with a similar shoe, but no hole and little tube. I used it several times to fix broken plastic things over the years, but it finally died and I trashed it.
I think that with any soldering iron with a shoe like that and a lot of practice you'll be able to fix a rain tray. I understand that you have several to practice on. I even fixed a 4" gash in a kayak with it once, it came out pretty good after I gently warmed it with a propane torch to blend the edges of the repair.