Cabriolet Top Replacement

I'm in the middle of fighting with USAA about coverage for repairs stemming from when a hawk damaged my 2004 C4S and they're giving me problems with covering an OEM top. I've got some questions and would appreciate input from the forum... 1. What are the aftermarket options? I can't imagine all aftermarket tops are the same quality. Are there ones to avoid? Are there ones that are OEM quality or better? Is there an appreciable aesthetic difference between the OEM top and most aftermarket tops to the knowledgeable people? 2. If I'm planning on keeping it for the long term should I just pay the difference for the OEM top? 3. 996 collectibility aside, am I impacting the value of the car by installing an aftermarket top? 4. Anything else I should consider? -Eric

I would push them for an OEM top installed by the dealer. I have a GAHH aftermarket top on my 2002. No complaints. It was installed by a local upholstery shop. Cost about $2k. But I payed out of my own pocket because the original top was old. If there was nothing wrong with your top before the hawk incident I don't see why you'd settle for non OEM. I believe that you have the right to demand original parts but I am no insurance expert.

I have a GAHH top too and it's the same material used by OEM tops. I don't believe there is any difference in quality. The GAHH top is around $2k installed, the Porsche top is over $6k installed.

I bought this one from Ebay. It was apparently made by the A or one of the H's in GAHH. After a few years it has been perfect. It's listed at $550 and the upholstery shop charged a little less than that so I was in at about $1100 or $1200 all in if I remember correctly. I wrote a post on it if you want to search. http://www.ebay.com/itm/911-996-997-...vFfWvA&vxp=mtr

I doubt an aftermarket top would affect the value of the car. It's a wear item, albeit a long-term wear item. Condition of the top is more important. I don't think non-OEM tires would affect the value very much either.

The important part is getting a good installer, it makes all the difference in the world. Whoever you end up getting the top from, ask if they can recommend a local shop near you they can vouch, I wished I had so I wouldn't have the pain and suffering I went through a couple of months ago........

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Thanks for your input! The dealer recommends a local shop which, it happens, has also been recommended by a friend who restores vehicles (he recently finished a 1,004 pt '69 Camaro - out of a potential 1005pts). I trust their recommendation and would like to use them. Unfortunately, they are (not surprisingly) very expensive. My deductible is very low so it makes sense for me to put the damage through insurance. I'm not sure I'll win on the OEM vs. non-OEM issue without enough information to support a position that the non-OEM is different enough that the OEM should be used. If, at the end of the day, the difference is the label on the canvas, I'm not going to lose sleep over it. If, however, the size of the glass will be smaller, the quality of the materials is noticeably different, or there are aesthetic differences, I'll have an issue. So far, all they've given me is a number broken down at a high level -- not an explanation as to how they reached their numbers for the individual repairs. I don't know, for example, what aftermarket company they've used as a benchmark for the price of the roof. We'll see. That's what I'm seeing, too. One other problem I'm having is that they want me to bring it to ONE shop to get it done -- "let them deal with us..." but they're not understanding that the upholstery shop wants nothing to do with the body work and I'm not giving the car to the body shop to do the work! They just want to cut me a check to "let the shops deal with any difference" but I actually don't want their money until we're on the same page about who is actually handling it. Thank you! Does it look and feel the same as the original? I've seen reference to that manufacturer as also being an OEM to Porsche for their tops. Thanks -- that's kind of what I'm thinking...as long as the top doesn't look different from the original. I appreciate your input. Yeah, thanks, that's what I've heard which is why I'm so keen on using the company recommended by my dealer and friend. I'm open to other suggestions but I've seen "good" upholstery jobs that I would consider anything but and I'm kind of **** about these types of things so I get nervous about the quality of blind recommendations on these kinds of repairs. Thanks for all of the input so far. I'll let you know what we work out. -Eric

Just maybe as a note, I'm sure the insurance company had someone go look online at the options out there and who also maybe would have come across postings like this that talk about a more affordable top being just fine.

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lol true -- but I haven't written anything that I would shy away from with my insurance company. I'm a reasonable guy. If the aftermarket option is the same as the OEM product then I'm fine with it...but I've found threads where people have complained of smaller windows and inferior materials and that's not acceptable to me. -Eric

For the 996.2s they reuse the glass from your OEM top so it is the same size. For the 996.1s you can replace the plastic rear window with glass but it needs to be narrower than the plastic so it can fit when folded. All this to say that your window will be the same. Btw my local dealer also uses a local upholstery shop to do installs. Shows you that it is specialized and no doubt fiddly work.

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Good to know. My car, being a 2004 C4S, is a 996.2 so it has a glass window already. I wasn't sure whether the aftermarket roof included a new window or whether they would reuse the existing OEM glass. Thanks! -Eric

I also had mine replaced with a GAHH top but for around $1600. The cables on the side were coming through and wouldn't close properly. A lot of the german cars use gahh as their top of choice from what i was told.

As far as it looking and feeling like the original.....it's black and doesn't leak. There aren't really any features of the top that would make it look or not look like the original. There's no contrast piping or anything. I can't tell the difference.

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In that vein I have seen GAHH and Haartz on metropol blue and they both matched the color of the roll bar covers well. There are others that are a poor match. I saw a very poor match with a color that looked like a sky blue that was supposed to match the metropol blue. I am not sure whose it was, the Owner was not around to ask.

Fair enough. Black is easy.