Last week I bought an Abarth rear spoiler for my new Punto GT. This is mainly a cosmetic add-on, as you have already guessed! It was bought at my local Fiat parts dealership, at a cost of GRD 35.500, while painting and fitting cost another GRD 15.000. (To find out what this cost is about, all you have to do is click here).
The spoiler is made of hard black plastic, by a German company, named Zender (are they the same VW-tuning people?!). It comes in a big box, along with fully illustrated instructions, in most european languages, and a TUV certificate. There's also a small box included, which contains all the essentials for the fitting. These are: A tube of glue, a plastic spatula, a small bottle of primer, a coarse sandpaper and a small can with cleaning agent. Theoretically, the whole process can be done by any home mechanic... Theoretically, of course!
First, I took only the spoiler to the auto body shop, for painting. The paintjob, as can be seen in the pics, is absolutely professionally done. Two days later, I took the car to have the spoiler fitted. I stood there, too, and watched the whole process...
I won't bother you with small details... But, despite the german origin of manufacture, the spoiler, when test fitted on its final position, without glue, would not seat well at the outer edge of the door's top. Mind you, this one is held in place only by the supplied glue. There's no hole opening and tapping screws here.
After some thought, we decided to fit it as it was, since it was already painted and could not be sanded again... Someone had an idea: Glue it on place and the load it carefully with some big loads, so that the edges would stick. And so we did...
After preparing the wing according to instructions for gluing, we put it on its final position and kept it in place with some paper masking tape. Then we carefully parked two pairs of Escort Cosworth disc rotors (really heavy!!!) on top of the wing, after we had isolated the area the discs would touch with packing bubble plastic.
The next morning, after removing the disc rotors, we found out we should have used a... press to hold down the edges.
Here you can clearly see the edge of the spoiler, not touching perfectly the roof. To view the actual image, click on the thumb.
So, we left it as is... Now, the edges of the spoiler, at its front corner leave some 2 mm of air between the spoiler and the top of the roof, while at the center, the spoiler has full contact. Who's fault is it? Mainly, mine and my paintman's, who both did not try to test fit the spoiler before painting. Secondly, either the manufacturer has lost something in the measures, or at the very last, the spoiler warped during transportation and storing, before it even reached my hands... I hope I'll live with this, as the worst happened on my way out that body shop! I crashed! See the details!
