412 Door seal

Discuss with fans and owners of the most luxurious aircooled sedan/wagon that VW ever made, the VW 411/412. Official forum of Tom's Type 4 Corner.
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VW 612 RS
Posts: 41
Joined: Fri Sep 04, 2009 11:05 am

412 Door seal

Post by VW 612 RS »

Hello!
Is there anyone who have part catalog for 411/412?
I´m looking for parts number for the door seals.
Does anyone know if there is any company who sell them?

Best Regards
Hans Olav
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Piledriver
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Re: 412 Door seal

Post by Piledriver »

The aftermarket seals for a t3 may work?
Have an overall length, I can measure mine.
They are a generic cross section and have to be glues in place with weatherstrip adhesive, but are nice and soft.
Addendum to Newtons first law:
zero vehicles on jackstands, square gets a fresh 090 and 1911, cabby gets a blower.
EZ3.6 Vanagon after that.(mounted, needs everything finished) then Creamsicle.
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raygreenwood
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Re: 412 Door seal

Post by raygreenwood »

Hello! as Pile notes....the general cross section is fairly generic and very close to type 3 and some late super beetles....but at the hinge end of the door its very specific (molded). here are the part #'s:

Left Door:
411-837-911 For models 411 through 416 and 461 through 466

421-837-911 for models 421-426

Right door:
411-837-912 For models 411 through 416 and 461 through 466

421-837-912 for models 421 through 426

For reference here is the table of Model types...not to be confused with the basic car type #.

411 2 door sedan "L" model right hand drive (RHD)
412 2 door sedan "L" model left hand drive (LHD)
415 2 door sedan RHD
416 2 door sedan LHD

421 4 door sedan "L" model LHD
422 4 door sedan "L" model RHD
425 4 door sedan RHD
426 4 door Sedan LHD

461 wagon variant "L" model LHD
462 wagon variant "L" model RHD
465 wagon variant LHD
466 wagon variant RHD

With some careful work you can duplicate the "flattened" molded area at the door hinge with some generic seal. Ray
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VW 612 RS
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Joined: Fri Sep 04, 2009 11:05 am

Re: 412 Door seal

Post by VW 612 RS »

Thank you Ray!
I tried to use seal from super beetle but they where to thick. They would´t fit on the top of the door. I think Type3 is very similar to Type1
After some searching I found very good seals in my own bunch of Type4 parts :)

I wonder where all the parts go after they stopped to sell parts for Type4. Did they just throw everything away?
Or is there someone who have a lots of Type4 parts?
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raygreenwood
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Re: 412 Door seal

Post by raygreenwood »

Through many years of searching for parts....across much of this country (mostly pre-internet)...I have spoken to quite a few friendly VW parts and service people. It was shocking around 1999, to find that I had part #'s that the VW dealer did not! Over the years I always looked at microfiche at the dealer.
Many times I had to tell the parts dept person...which microfiche it was...."the one in the back of the file box that you never use". They would mostly (the yound ones)...note..."damn...I have never seen one of those".

One day at Boardwalk VW in Dallas I stopped to look at something in the dealer microfiche that I had looked at before. When the microfiche was inserted in the viewer...I noted that instead of the assembly view and part number listing that I had seen the year before.....I saw an assembly picture with no part #'s and a band across the film frame that said "obsolete or discontinued".
When I asked the parts person what gives...he noted that beleive it or not...VW continually updates their dealer microfiches...or at least still were in 1999.

The conversation continued that VW had a habit of roughly 10 years after a model was dead if there were no cross match parts to modern vehicles....they gathered all parts to regional VW of america warehouses...then either destroyed flimsier parts...or shipped them back to VW of Germany.

For a while...the ability to order parts from Europe remained so long as the part #'s remained on the microfiche....but that was no guarantee of inventory. When I noted that I had the part #'s I required.....the parts person noted that he could not order the parts because the part # is not all that is required. there are computere generated codes and stock #'s noting bins and locations...and those no longer existed.....meaning the parts were no longer there.

I would bet that many of them may have been auctioned off to some people...most i would bet were destroyed. For quite a long time from the late 80's to just about 5-7 years ago....there were very, very few type 4's running either in Europe or the US. Most were sitting moldering in barns and back yards...and were not discarded simply because many of them were quite costly when new and died at a young age.

With the internet and E-bay...the last five years have been a rennaissence (damn I could never spell that word!)....of sorts for the 411/412. In the late 90's after some checking of DMV records where I could...I could confiednetly say that in 2000...there were maybe 150-200 running and tagged type 4 vehicles on this continent. I would not be surprised if that # is approaching 500. They have been coming out of the woodwork......but most of the parts are long gone.

The VW warehouses occasionally turned up some parts. They were vast and things got lost and refound. Some other large parts warehouses systems....like those originally attached to BAP Geon, NOPI and Beck Arnley... have some parts that seem to turn up once in a while during house cleaning. Ray
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