FE Sedan rubber boot seals

[JohnBM]

Anyone have a good experience with a replacement rubber boot seal ? Rare spares have one , but not quite the real deal . A couple of companies advertising, appreciate any feedback. Cheers . John . Ps . I’ve added a photo of a section of the real McCoy . That came with my car from new .

[my8thholden]

used the newer seal on my resto this year, can see it members completed projects on here ,they only introduced last 12 mths ,Old Auto Rubber at Penrith ,ask for Mark ..Vern

[JohnBM]

Hi Vern ,yes I’ve been on to Mark old rubber co , he’s sending me what his company is offering, the original was a solid foam section , as opposed to other on offer . Have everything prepared to take the new seal . I’ll go for old rubber co , to try . Once glued up difficult to remove

[2brite]

my boot seal is a rare spares from 20 odd years ago,fits perfectly.

i dont know if they have changed or improved on that run of seals back then

[JohnBM]

Have fitted the seal , supplied by Old Auto Rubber. Penrith NSW . And as near to the original so far . & it went in really well . When closing the lid I noticed an area of the seal just (oozing) or bulging out slightly, & the lid taking a bit more of an effort to close ( understandably) . on one of the sites I was looking at when trying to find a company who sold them I noticed in a caption, that adjusting the striker may be required slightly, so not so much of an effort to close the lid and in turn not pushing out the seal. I have a spare lid and see there is no adjustment possible with the four bolt holes attached to the lid . The boot lid itself is slightly misaligned when you have a good look ,but could have been like that since new. Anyway I have shut the lid & will leave it that way for a week or so to see it that helps .   Has anyone else had a similar experience. ? Cheers .John .

[Errol62]

I fitted all rare spares seals to my sedan many years ago. They were the solid square with comma tail type. I had a similar experience with the seal popping out and hard to close but settlied down after a time.

You can adjust the striker fixed to the body but I wouldn't. Not much else you can do adjustment wise without using spacers on or bending the hinges.

One thing that never resolved is that the new seal continued to leak at the front corners.

Sent from my SM-G973F using Tapatalk

[ardiesse]

John,

You'll probably need to adjust the striker on the body, just above the fuel filler.  Its mounting holes are slotted to allow up-and-down movement.  Ease it up a couple of millimetres.  You could also get a pressure-pak of "Rubber Magic" from Rare Spares, which is a good rubber lubricant.  (Or use liquid soap.)

Leaving the boot closed for a few weeks is a good idea.  Just remember to push the oozy-out bit of the seal back in with your thumbnail when the boot's closed.  After a couple of years the seal will conform.

Rob

[JohnBM]

Thanks for your replies: Errol 62 & Rob. Much appreciated. I’ll leave adjusting the striker .if required down the road , if leaving the boot shut for a while doesn’t help . & yes Rob the seal is all tucked in  . Cheers ,John .

[my8thholden]

John .As per my previous post ,I have used the same seal ,and can relate to all you have stated , in my recent resto , you can see in project cars finished on here ,when we put the boot lid on it was really odd ,high on right side and low on left side ,facing it ,it had minimal work on it ,was not like it before ,so put it down to body work , so a little ttweak of the hinges ,adjust striker ,get inside look for day light ,water test ,close lid ,tuck in one little bulge ,left closed few weeks ,its all good,I have one observation ,along the top edge ,ie below glass ,the seal sits a bit low in its groove ,and a lot of little bits of dust , grit and shit ,gets in there ,bit of a nuisance , by way we installed the lip facing outwards , we tried it inwards and did not sit right ..cheers Vern

[JohnBM]

Thanks Vern , your a gentleman & a scholar, I have some of the original seal from when the car was new with paint overspray on it so convinced it’s in the right way . Yes , lid is going to be shut for awhile to see if that fixes the bulge problem . I’ll also go the completed projects section now for a look see . Cheers John .

[JohnBM]

Just to annoy everyone even more , re boot seal , I was looking at my old original seal , as you do , and I noticed at what appeared to be as the seal approached each corner or bend it was segmented or had been cut & and a small (very small ) section put in . I presume to help it from twisting or the like when installing it . In other words it seems it wasn’t in one continuous piece like we do nowadays . Or maybe it was ,but the joins helped to place it in position . Just something the old bugger noticed wiling away time .🤔cheers .John

[my8thholden]

you are right John ,original had moulded corner sections  vulcanised in , no one does that now , the current Rares outer door seals do though..Mark at Old Auto Rubber told me their current boot seal is a new version introduced about 12 mths ago , one continous extruded length though ,thats what you and I have , I feel it could be improved even more ,I will be taking the car to him for him to have a look , he is keen to keep improving their product ..cheers Vern .

[Ken's 57]

Hi John. I too have experienced the same issues after I was talked into replacing the original (leaking) boot seal. The first seal was a solid rubber unit and the boot lid sat high and was hard to close...had to be slammed shut. As the boot had always been easy to shut and well aligned I wasn’t prepared to live with it. So I ordered one from Rares and when it arrived I noticed it was hollow in the centre....unlike the previous one. I dry fitted it and when the lid was closed it aligned well but bulged along the entire length of the bottom edge as well as on the lower sides. I played around with it and found that if I sat the seal at a slight angle along the bottom edge as well as half way up the sides (rather than squarely in the channel) it no longer bulged when closed. I bit the bullet and glued it in like this, fully expecting that it would look right but leak as it did before. As the car rarely gets wet, this was a compromise I could live with. To my great joy, I found it not only sits correctly but does not leak either. Hope this helps.
Cheers, Ken