Abstract: A vehicle weatherstrip, beltstrip or door seal includes a hybrid carrier or core and extruded or molded elastomeric sealing features. The hybrid carrier includes lineal sections of diverse flexibility and compressibility which are achieved by upsetting the metal carrier by lancing, stamping or coining and, optimally, stretching. Preferably, the carrier is manufactured in a continuous length, the elastomeric material is extruded or molded thereover and the resulting product is cut into useable lengths having the desired more flexible and more rigid regions disposed along its length which correspond to corners and straight sections, respectively, of for example, a glass run.

Abstract: A join-free sealing strip 1 is disclosed for fitting to the window frame (1) of a vehicle door (5). This sealing strip has embedded therein a slotted carrier. The carrier is stretch bent (or otherwise treated) at regions L5M where there is a sharp corner to increase the rigidity of the strip (1) in these regions. At a position (O) between these regions the carrier is arranged to be relatively less rigid and to be relatively easily extendible and/or compressible. The strip (1) can be simply fitted to the door frame (3) due to the rigid sharp corner regions L5M. The relatively less rigid region (O) between the corner regions allows variations in the dimensions between different door frames (3) to be accommodated. A procedure for avoiding indentations in the flexible material of the strip (1) being visible at positions corresponding to the locations of the slots in the carrier (i.e. avoiding carrier read-through) is also disclosed.