The Stovebolt Site Forums The Shop Area Paint and Body Shop Doors Cat wiskers ??

I have a 51' GMC and the doors are going back together and I ran into a snag with the "cat whisker" antirattle felt strips.When I took the doors apart I had cat whiskers on both the outside and inside of one of the doors. The driver side had not only the cat whiskers on the inside molding but it also had them mounted to the stainless steel molding attached to the window opener sandwiching the window between. Has anyone else run into this? My question is are there supposed to be cat whiskers on both sides of the glass or just on the inside window molding. I replaced the rubber antirattle strip in the door and there seems to be enough room for cat whiskers to be attached to the door molding and not bind the window. Thanks

If your GMC is like a Chevrolet, the whiskers-strip was stapled to the door on the inside and a rubber scraper strip was slid into a groove in the door on the outside.

If I'm wrong, we'll soon hear about it.

Tim is correct if indeed your GMC is like a Chevy.
My 52 Chevy is just as Tim says above.

May I add a comment.
Most vendors that sell The "cat whiskers" that are stapled to the inside only sell them STRAIGHT. The originals curved up a little at the back.
I ordered mine and they are straight but the day after I got them :mad: I saw them in another vendors listing that had the curve in them. They were a little more but I wish I had them. You just can't curve the straight ones...even though they may work OK the ones already curved would be nice.

Some guys glue these on, some use staples like original. I don't have staples so I'll probably glue mine on and see if it holds.

I could not get the staples to work without bending them and did not know about the glue, so I put a couple pop rivets in to hold mine. Not original but worked out fine for my non-show truck.

Right, on the inside only, and I don’t see why the doors would be any different on the GMC of that year. Ya'll listen to Alvin about the pre-curved anti-tattle strips/inner seal. I have access to a machine shop so I ended up making a special bender that held the strips flat while I bent them. If you just try bending them by hand they will kink and the crimp that holds the fabric strip will open up.

Also, depending on how original you want to stay or how patient you are, the original staple holes in the garnish can be reused. I clamped the strip to the garnish using padded wood blocks to keep from bending or scaring the parts. Then I transferred the holes one at a time by putting a small punch mark from the back side, thru the original holes using a 90° scriber tip from inside the garnish. Then I drilled the anti-rattle strip one at a time re-clamping them with pre-drilled staples loosely inserted for alignment. After all the staples were located and drilled I set them with a pair of channel lock pliers that I had ground the jaws on to fit around the garnish.

I bought staples from two different vendors and neither were the right size. So, back to the machine shop and I made a bending fixture with the proper leg spacing to match the origninal holes and knocked out a hand full of my own staples.

It looks absolutely original, but it’s a lot work and that’s why most just pop-rivet them and the window run channel and have done with it.
DG

Thanks guys! I'am starting to think that these doors and inside windo garnish mouldings are not original to this truck.I have vent windos and the inside garnish mouldings don't fit over the three screws that hold the vent windo frame to the door with out knotching them out for the screws,other than that they fit perfect.The screw holes line up fine also.These must be off an older truck without vent windos.I forgot to say that they are stainless steel not regular steel.I went with the prebent repop cat wiskers for the garnish moulding and after alot of frustration with the supplied staples went the pop rivit route.I also think that someone put the "wiskers" on the door just above the rubber scraper for some unknown reason,"probably a mistake".So I guess the only place the wiskers go is on the inside garnish moulding facing out against the glass and not on the inside of the door facing in to the glass.Does this sound right?

yep, sounds right...just don't forget the little rubber "anti rattle" strip that slides in the little groove. It is what presses/rides against the outside of the window. I usually just call the little rubber strips "wipers" !!
I ran into the garnish moulding issue as well. Some other person had even put the earlier, and wider, window channel in the doors which did not work.....I think they were "trying to" but gave up. At least thats the way it looked when I got the doors....which also meant that I had to buy the correct channel guides!!
If all the holes on the garnish mounding line up you can trim them where the little cut out needs to be for the wing vent. But I'll bet if you put an ad in the swap meet somebolter will have an extra one....then you can pass on yours to someone who needs it like it is.

Don't worry about me ever forgetting those "little rubber anti rattle strips" Achipmunk! You may call them "wipers",but I have a whole lot of other names I'd like to call them.