Seriously, how well were the 68-72 hardtop A body cars sealed up? I have spent LOTS of time carefully adjusting windows, doors, weatherstripping all trying to make the car more comfortable. I think I have done a decent job, until someone goes for a ride. Once I get to about 50-60 mph, the go for the window handle thinking the windows aren’t up all the way. The noise isn’t bad ( in my opinion) just not new car quiet. Am I trying to fix a normal issue? Thanks

 

You may be trying to fix something that ain't broke. These cars were not whisper quiet.

 

I found that a little more volume on the radio corrects any noise problems!

 

And louder exhaust.

 

I've gone through the same problems with my '68. I replaced every piece of weather stripping on the car, took some serious time to get all the glass adjusted & I still get some wind noise from the vent windows. One thing I noticed is that like most of the re-pop parts made for our cars, they just aren't the same quality is the originals!! I used Metro-molded weatherstrips & while they fit nicely they just weren't the same. Take the roof rail weatherstrips for example. The originals had a squiggly metal wire that was molded in the whole length of the rubber for stiffness, the new metro ones have no metal wire in them at all! The vent window seals were the same way. The originals had a metal "spine" inside them to give the spring clips running down the front something to grip to,again no metal in the re-pops!! Opening the 4bbls a lot while driving corrects my noise problems!!!

 

Newer cars have double or triple door seals and much better sealing of the window glass to the door frame seals (vs. single door seals and "casual" sealing of our windows to an un-framed door). By design, old cars will never be as quite as newer cars.

 

I chuckle a little when I see things like this. It's not a bad thing to try and reduce wind noise, but if you want it to be pin-drop quiet, it won't be done with stock parts.

These are ~50 year old cars, give or take. Consider when your car was new. It's like comparing your car to a 1918-1922 car back then. So a new car 50 years ago would be miles better on wind noise reduction in comparison. It's all relative. Some of those old cars didn't even have side windows, let alone good door seals. Cabin quietness has come a long way but if you can keep 99.99% of the water out, a little wind noise isn't a big deal by comparison. Water intrusion the biggest concern for me.

 

I like that "casual sealing of our Windows"

my newer truck is so quiet on the highway I can drive w the radio volume at 6-8 on the indicator.

my 13 year old truck it replaced required 20 on the volume indicator but it made some other noises besides wind!

 

I’ve put time in on this on 2 66 big cars. One convertible, one hardtop. I’m still working on it. I’ve got a thing about wind noise, As noted above water intrusion is the real enemy.

Challenges:
Judging old cars by new standards is hopeless, but I still kind of do it. Our 2017 Audi is quiet as a church at freeway speed, but has 3 door seals and no vent windows. The 60’s GM design wasn’t perfect, the door hinges sag, reproduction parts aren’t quite the same, and window adjustment screws can freeze from rust impeding perfect placement. Convertibles are tougher than hard tops since the sealing rails move. Also convertibles used 3 hard rubber roof rails where the hardtops used 1 more pliable sponge rubber seal per side. Sponge rubber seals better than hard rubber being more pliable and generally having more “crush” to make up for imperfections in window adjustment. I believe GM went away from wing windows in the late 60’s in part due to noise concerns, so I think between cost & feedback they found a better way after my cars were built.

Reproduction seals are ok. I’m using a mix of manufacturers - soffseal for hardtop roof rails, Steele for quarter window leading edges, Steele or maybe Metro for convertible roof rails. I tried replacing the wing window seals in the convertible, but found reproductions are missing the brass core GM used. The 50 year old GM hard rubber takes a “set” which seems to work quieter than the reproduction stuff. I left the hardtop alone. So far...

When you dive in, removing all the door and quarter interior panels just to get at the window adjustment nuts and bolts potentially damages cardboard door cards. Then when the door panels are off, if you test drive it on the freeway, you get so much wind noise from the doors, you can’t really tell if the windows are still a problem. Time consuming.

Approaches
On both cars, I’ve shimmed the roof rails down tighter onto the windows using a bit of 1” wide closed cell foam above the roof rails. I think 7/16’s thick (or deep) for the convertible and right now 3/16’s for the hardtop.

Hardtop
The foam strip is fitted above the stainless roof rail in the hardtop. This pushes the roof rails and Soffseal reproduction sponge rubber down more snugly onto the windows. But at the back window I tapered ithe foam so as not to push the rear windows forward. It still whistles a bit, so I don’t have it right. My next move is 5/16’s thick to see if a tighter seal halps, but I’m still messing with window placement too. If this next hardtop experiment fails, I’m thinking about getting 16’ or so of oversized sponge rubber from Steele to see if taller, or thicker seals help. The key constraint is that universal seals must fit the factory roof rail rubber retention channel width to stay put. They provide samples free and I’ve test fitted some universal samples, but haven’t bought anything yet. I have sample numbers and profiles if anyone wants to try on their own. Happy to share.

Convertible
The 66 98 used 3 pieces of rubber with a brass insert per side. I think of the pieces as front, middle and rear. The fronts need the thickest shim due to door hinge sag on my car. The middles need less shim, the rears don’t need much at all. Also my frame is 350,000 miles old, so it bends just a little over bumps, but a raised top minimizes this moving target. My top may be slightly improperly adjusted, but it’s close enough that I can “fill in the gap”. Literally. Lately I’m thinking of trying sponge rubber on it too, just to see if it would be better than factory hard rubber. I think the 70’s 88 convertibles went to thick hollow center sponge rubber seals. Am I right about this?

Adjustments
Roof rail screws are connected the cars via slots which allow both forward/back and a little in/out adjustment. I tend to nudge the roof rails out as far as allowed for a tight seal. That may be wrong since I’m still at it. I also try not to stretch the sponge rubber front-to-rear to leave it as thick as possible.

The windows have 7 or so adjustments each which costs a lot of time to get even “good enough”. I’m following the “start with the rears” logic since they’re more fixed position than door windows. Plus rears are simpler with just one pane, not the main glass + ventipane assembly. What’s tricky with the fronts is you think you have them correct against the rears, then you button It all up with interior panels, and on the test drive you hear noise coming from the vent window leading edge. So you adjust the cast wing window assembly against the A pillars and you’ve changed the front window positioning. That’s when I start again on the front windows since they slot into the back side of the ventipanes.

I’ve chased my tail as you can see. Admittedly no expert, eager to see what tips you all have.

Cheers
Chris

 

I have the drivers side sealed up pretty well, mainly because when I’m driving I can tell exactly where the noise is coming from, and can visualize in my head what the window needs to do. My concern is putting the window up with the door closed, and it takes more effort to close the door than I think it should. In other words, the glass is pressed against the seal more than it really should be.

 

My everyday driver is an 07 Grand Marquis, not a whisper quiet car but my 70 cutlass doesn’t compare, my Cutlass is a post coupe and has the window frames. Newer cars don’t turn into rattle boxes the way the old cars did. I suspect a total restoration of an old car can mitigate many of the problems when they are reassembled to prevent things from loosening up, to me rattles are more irritating than wind noise. I did own a beautiful 71 Coupe Deville, bought from the original owner who meticulously maintained it. That was a very quiet car compared to my Cutlass. The Caddy did have an annoying squeak that I finally discovered was the windows rubbing against the seals, the squeaks went away when the seals were wet but since I hardly ever drove it in the rain I quieted it down with silicone. I would love to ride in a well maintained 98 from that era and hear how it compares, to me they are just as nice as the cadillacs.

 

Most of the vehicles I've had trouble with wind noise the noise was coming from the side mirrors. While driving you could put your hand on the mirror and the noise would quit so I changed out the mirror and the problem was fixed.

 

This thread makes me chuckle, too. Since my '64 is a convertible and has glass packs instead of a stock resonator / muffler set up, I don't worry at all about noise. It is what it is. However, for daily drivers... that's another story. My soon-to-be-sold '05 Lesabre has a squeak somewhere in the back that I've been unable to find in the 7 years I've owned it. My new Lacross has active noise cancellation, and I love it. I have tinnitus from too much loud music / 2-stroke engines, so I really enjoy my "quiet time" in the new car.

 

Old cars aren't going to be as quiet as new cars simply because old cars weren't designed to be nearly as aerodynamic. The trend towards making the windows flush with the body of the car (which greatly reduces wind noise) only started with the '86 Taurus. It's one of those design features of the Taurus that gave it its unique look that isn't immediately identifiable to the average car owner. All modern cars copy it, and that's why they've all looked so samey since the Taurus.

 

I think my car is quieter than my wifes 07 Mustang.

 

It's hard to overstate how influential the jellybean Taurus was. It looks so unremarkable today because most modern cars copied it to a very large extent.

 

My wind noise tends to whistle - "As it goes through my teeth from the big *** grin I get from driving my 72 CS"

I put Steele Rubber seals in mine and they are the best and do very well until I get the side winds can't do much about that. But turn up the radio.

 

I think on the long scale the divide between "classic" cars and just old modern cars will begin with the Taurus. In other words: the Taurus and the jellybean cars that followed will never be considered "classics". Is there any real difference in body style between current cars and 90s cars except the trunk was a little longer in the 90s and headlights were rectangular and had Fresnel lenses to imitate sealed beams?

 

"Classic " cars have round headlights .
" Just old " cars don't .
Actually I would put the dividing line between 1979 and 1980 . Or FWD vs. RWD .
Your mileage may vary .

 

I tend to agree due to preservation bias (try finding a K-car or FWD A-body from the 80s anywhere), but there are classic RWD platforms that survived into the 80s, and Ford's Panther platform had the same generation from the late 70s all the way to the early 90s.

 

The Panther platform survived to 2011, the last Crown Vics, Grand marquis and Town Cars. Though by 2011 only the Vic was being produced. They became much more streamlined but remained as the last full size RWD, body on frame with V8s.

Surprisingly just last week I saw a K car in a parking lot, a very rare sight. Most of those rotted to nothing. I almost on a daily basis during the summer and fall see a classic or two.