Half doors/sidescreens advice

Hi Adam

I'm just going down the same route. I have just ordered some half doors from Oxted/Thundersport and yes they were about the price you quoted (Oxted are actually the company who make all of Caterham's products so they are not allowed to undercut Caterham prices although you can get a club discount with them which I'm not sure Caterham will do). When I ordered them Jo  offered me two options. 1. a 'floppy' racing door which is basically just a piece of material that is press studded across and a 'rigid' half door with armrest that is much more like the full Caterham door, just without the window bit on the top. I've opted for the later. I have no experience of the Soft Bits door but given the price I suspect it is similar to Thundersports 'racing door'. I suppose it depends on what you need them for. If they are only ever going on for track days and you just want something to protect from gravel the racing door would probably be fine but if you do longer country road blats then the rigid door with the armrest would probably be the one to go for. All I can say is the Thudersport option may seem expensive but the quality is second to none (if you search my posts you will see some pics of the tillet cushions and transmission tunnel they made for me). The only other thing I would say is they quote 12 weeks as these are made to order but with covid they seem to be taking twice as long but even if you ordered off Caterham they'd probably still take as long unless they hold stock because they'd come from Thundersport anyway.

Hi Adam,

Re SBFS. The photo of the green 7 on their half-doors page of their website is my car. I purchased those half-doors in Feb 2002 and they're still in use today on the 'same' car. No, they don't have the elbow bulge of the Caterham ones but that's never been an issue for me.

From a touring point of view I think they have an advantage as they can easily be rolled up and stored in the boot of behind the seats when not needed. They are made so you can added a strengthening rod/bar inside the top edge. I just use a a length of plastic oval conduit.

You can also get gloss black ABS half door from YC plastics too   

I got both gloss black and carbon look from YC Plastics - Steve was a great help. 
Am presently designing/prototyping a hinge so the doors open "lambo" style. 
I can add photos if it's of interest. 
My progress so far can be seen on Instagram, @chrisl3ete.
You dont need an Instagram account to view them. 

Most definitely. My order took six months. Placed in June, delivered just before Christmas. To be fair I also placed an order with Softbits at the same time and that took six months as well. The softbits order was just for a standard split tonneau but they couldn't get a supply of mohair. I think whoever you order with at the moment its going to be a long wait.