digitalrurouni

Gotta say thanks to the OP of this thread for getting me to take the plunge and get the GT4 front spoiler installed on my Spyder. It looks great! It's a subtle change overall in making the Spyder look a bit more aggressive and I love it. I was worried about it scraping when pulling up on my driveway but looks like I am safe!

flpnout

Please post pic.

SpyderSenseOC

So what did you need in addition to the three plastic pieces that make up the spoiler? Did you buy a couple of screws and speed nuts? Did the vertical pieces you bought come with the adhesive tape or did you have to buy that separately?

digitalrurouni

Hello pics as requested.

I basically ordered the parts from Suncoast and drove over to my local Porsche specialist indy shop and they did all the work for me. They said the side pieces were a slight bit tricky. If you want I can find out more about what they did. I do not believe I have the skill set to have done this work myself nor the tools! My stock front spoiler was a bit scraped up too. Now the goal is to see how long I can keep this new one pristine lol.

flpnout

Looks good. Thanks for sharing! Debating if I want to try this again. If I remember correctly, the challenge with the side pieces is to get a thicker double sided 3m in order to get them to stick better or they will keep coming undone from the pressure from the front spoiler causing the side pieces to start lifting towards the top.

SpyderSenseOC

That's the first time I've heard that. Why would the center piece exert abnormal pressure on the side pieces?

digitalrurouni

Possibly from the car being driven and the oncoming air hitting the lip?

flpnout

From scraping it causing some flex. Hence why the side pieces should be well secured.

SpyderSenseOC

I would lump that into the "normal" category.

SpyderSenseOC

Installing the GT4 front lip on my Spyder and encountered a problem in that the GT4 verticals are further away from the body than the Spyder verticals are and the two sided adhesive used by Porsche isn't thick enough to reach the trim piece. I'm going to have to build it out a bit. Without the adhesive doing the job, these things will fly off because there's no other retention method in use. I'll post pics later.

SpyderSenseOC

Exactly. The tape ain't thick enough! And not by a long shot.

I just finished my install and I have a few thoughts and comments. First, the GT4 bumper cover is not the same as a Spyder cover so the GT4 vertical pieces just don't mate perfectly to the Spyder. It's not a big deal but does change the approach. You can forget about removing the old two sided tape if you don't want to. Your new vertical pieces won't get within 1/4 of it so no sense wasting the time to remove it.

Second, you need a way to secure the verticals to the cover. I guess you could use a variety of butyl or silicone and that would probably work. What I did instead was remove the two screws holding the wheel liner in place to access the back side of where the vertical piece's two tabs will eventually reside and put a couple of self tapping machine screws through them. Speed nuts or push-on clips would probably be better but I didn't have any and I don't think it was necessary. The two screws held the verticals on nice and tight at the top and middle, and the lip itself will hold the vertical in place at the bottom.

Third, the Spyder lip has a hole at each end that is used to hold the lip to the bumper cover and the lip is retained to the cover with a very light duty, plastic expanding retainer with a small metal screw. The GT4 lip holes do not line up with where the Spyder lip's did so I bought the robust Torx screws that I saw in the GT4 parts diagram (part number 999-073-24109) and screwed them in, making my own holes. I would have again preferred a speed nut (the GT4 diagram shows it has them) but due to the configuration of the Spyder, I could not get a speed nut on the Spyder's bumper cover.

Here's a few pics of what I did. I'll massage this post later to be a better DIY with captions in the appropriate places.

As you can see below, I added some 3M tape over the Porsche material I bought with the lip and it wasn't even close to enough. The distance between the plastic of the bumper cover and this piece is just too much for two sided tape to do the job.





Below is a pic of the GT4 and Spyder verticals side by side. You can clearly see the little tabs that I secured with self tapping screws. Be careful. They're fragile. I pre-drilled them on one side to avoid the screw breaking them off instead of drilling through them.



Below is a pic of the cleaned up area with new Porsche double sided tape applied. As I said, you don't really need this tape because it will never make contact with the vertical due to the configuration. And I tried.



Below is a pic of the inner liner with its two screws removed. You don't need to remove anything else to gain enough access to the back side of the cover where the vertical's tabs are.



Below is a pic of me peeling the liner back to expose the area where I installed the retaining screws. Just line them up with the tab slots and you're good to go.



These are the Home Depot screws I had on hand and they worked great. I recommend having a box of these in your garage because they are awesome for many applications.



Below is a pic of the retainer screws installed, with a mark I made with a Sharpie to indicate the middle of the tab slot.



Below is a pic of the GT4 self tapping screw that I installed because the old Spyder retention clips were insufficient and the holes were in the wrong place.



And the finished product. Whew.

SpyderSenseOC

And if any Spyder owner needs a perfectly good used Spyder lip and verticals with only the usual scratches, come and get 'em. So Cal area. No shipping.

SpyderSenseOC

I just noticed when looking at the parts catalog (to see whether the GT4 bumper cover is different than the Spyder) that Porsche lists the Spyder front bumper cover and chin spoiler as DISCONTINUED already. That's odd given the car is only 4 years old. Might be time to grab one while you can.

Also, what is the URL for the Porsche sponsored parts site? The link I used to go to is no longer taking me there.

kitwetzler

nice work. Haha. I'm coming back to my own post from 2016 because I bought another 981 Spyder and I was happy to find someone found a better way! (FYI - the way I did my original installs was I think 3 layers of 3m VHB tape, which worked but was not ideal.)

I liked the idea of securing the tabs with self tapping screws so did just that. Thanks for the suggestion.