Extra repairs and parts. Makes a lot of sense.

Wow that labor rate is really high. Of course, you can make $100k a year in SF and still be forced to live in a shack an hour away in Northern California.

It's the price one pays for living in a really nice part of the country I guess :D

For those who aren't too bright and live here, that's true. But those of us who went to real non-California Universities and know better, this place is amazing. I used to ******************** and moan about housing costs (I still moan about electricity and gas costs, but life goes on) until I watched everyone lose their shirts in the bust that many midwesterners like myself had accurately predicted many moons ago. Then I bought 4 houses at half priced, and I pay $0 per month in overhead to keep a roof over my head. I did have to move out of SF, but I'm only 20 minutes to my job from Oakland now, and I'm in the safe part of the worst city in America. Which is to say, I rarely have to witness murders.

Life's good in Cali; just make sure you write off all your taxes so that you're not encouraging their reckless spending.

Top completed... low quality pic forthcoming. High quality pics coming tomorrow....

Top is TIGHT fit. It's quite firm, and a little bit difficult to close, as expected. The low quality pic doesn't do it justiced (the DSLR is taking pics tonight after a wash), but the car looks brand new. Love it. Thanks Metzel Auto Upholstery of San Francisco.



http://picasaweb.google.com/jondirty/JonnyWonderTheBitterCapitalist?authkey=Gv1sRgCKKrw _iszp2LjQE#5426719809096838626

For what it's worth, I was told by the company that installed mine -- one that has been doing convertible tops since the 1920s -- that I should keep the top up (closed) for about 2 weeks if possible.

The fabric that is used by GAHH stretches a bit. They said that it's simply too tight for ease of use immediately after the install ... if it feels too tight you might just want to close it up for awhile. Hard to do, I know!

Others may have had different experiences but it worked well in my case.

Was given the same advice by the shop that installed my GAHH top and it's worked out well also.

New Pics Online
 

http://picasaweb.google.com/jondirty/Porsche#

LOVE the GAHH top. Worth the price of admission

this may be the way i go when i need to replace the top/window. but i'll hopefully do the install myself to save the $$$

do find a good installer
 

I got my glass top gahh top about two years ago directly from them. I asked them for recommendations of installers in my area. I called the three the recommended and went with the cheapest one...ABC Auto Upholstery in San Jose...it was about $580 to install including a few new trim pieces / seals that needed to be replaced. it didn't fit right. I took it back. still not right. still not right. got a run-around for 6 months...I'd show up when they said to come in and 'the right installer' wouldn't be there....they'd make small tweaks and suggest I wait two weeks for it to settle in....blah, blah, blah.

It was a huge waste of time and PITA. so I called GAHH back...turns out ABC had changed ownership and GAHH was no longer a big supporter and turned me on to Roth Schleck at Premier Auto Upholstery in Santa Clara. I'd called Roth when I first got the top to get a price quote...he was more expensive, so I'd gone with ABC. I went to Roth to see if he could fix the top...within 10 minutes he'd shown me two or three things that were done completely wrong with the initial install. He then worked with Jack at GAHH to get me a new top since the original crappy install had over-stretched it. Roth picked me up and dropped me off from work, was as professional and friendly as they get, etc, etc...bottom line, I couldn't recommend him more highly. Live and learn...but I should have paid up and gone to him in the first place. I was thinking it just couldn't be that hard to install a top...turns out there's a lot more art to it that I thought. The top is very nice too. I love the convenience of not having to fold my plastic window anymore. along with the software mod to do one-touch...it's awesome.

I haven't had to access the engine bay yet, but another amazing thing that Roth does is if you need to have better access to the engine, he'll send a guy over to the shop where your car is being worked on and release the whole top to give the techs huge access.

the gahh top does have a different aesthetic, which I like. the top has a slightly different profile which resembles the old 911 speedsters. and on an unrelated note (but it was mentioned in this thread)...I like black wheels on certain color boxsters / porsches...to me, it gives the car a bit of an old-school Fuchs-like look.

I'm quite happy about the $800 in labor my SF installer charged for an amazing job. Worth not having to deal with the debacle you described. Do you have any pics of your ride? I definitely want to get my wheels blacked out, but not sure where to have it done in the Bay Area..

I tried posting the pics...
 

but they didn't post...hmmm...

mine are kinesis k58 3-piece rims with polished lip and black powder centers.
email me at johnleck at comcast dot net and I'll send you some pics.
I had the wheels done at a no-name place in SF...forget the name.

Love your car. Super clean. Love the rims; I just searched, and they're $1k each? Seems a bit spendy.. but they do look damn fine.

the k58's
 

I bought them used with near-new pilot sports for $2k. then spent $800 having them polished and painted. so the wheels alone really only cost me about $1600.
they're 996 offset so I run a spacer on the rears to compensate.
they are very light and strong...it's the best place to drop weight on the car...and since I'll be tracking the car, there's no room for crappy wheels.

keep your eyes open for guys selling them used...kinesis, fikse, others...you can find some great deals.

I highly recommend the acoustic fabric on the GAHH top. The acoustic fabric actually makes the car as quiet as my hard-top.


In fact, I haven't bothered to even put my hard-top on the car yet this year. My car is a DD.