Aargh! We Tried Fitting New Roof.....small Cable Problem (long Ramble!)

[Guest wolfslair]

Hi, I haven't been here in ages.....wish I had thought of reading the posts before we tried replacing my cabbie roof last weekend!

 

We acquired a manual roof (free from a neighbour scrapping his cabbie) as mine was in desperate need of replacing (split at all seams and held together with black silicone!!).

 

My hubby is not mechanically minded at all but says' what the hell it can't be THAT hard'. Anyway, my cabbie has a power hood, so we thought to save getting in a right state, just change the outer and leave the roof frame and hood lining as they are. Well not only did it take most of the weekend and a lot of swearing.....but we had big problems with the hood cable (looking on this forum I should have been prepared!!).

 

Our idea was to take note of how the old roof was held in place and put the new one on in the same way. EXCEPT for some reason the tension cable that was originally on my car was situated above the 'beading' on my original roof (i.e. the beading was under the metal guttering at the back, with the tension cable above the beading but still under the guttering.....am I making sense?). So we tried and tried and tried and tried to position the cable in the same place on the replacement roof......for hours we held it while it was tightened and swore when it slipped off AGAIN and AGAIN. Then my 10 year old daughter (ggggrrrrrrr!) said 'mummy, shouldn't it go underneath?' ....we looked at the replacement roof and sure enough (DOH!), it appeared to have a lot of material underneath the 'beading' (there wasn't any on my old roof), so in theory (if we are right), the cable fits UNDERNEATH the beading pulled tight so that the beading is pulled under the gutter holding it all in place???

 

We fitted like this and it seemed ok, but now the material seems to be slipping out of the guttering! Help! we should never have attempted this in the first place!! Do I have to remove the cable and start again?? Or is there a knack to fitting the cable? Should we have glued the vinyl in place? and whats this about using a piece of wood to hammer it i place???

 

Any advice would be appreciated, and yes I feel completely daft and am standing in the corner with a 'D' on my head!!

 

Jo

[Guest robman1]

dont u need a new cable?

[Guest wolfslair]

I don't know? We re-used the old one because it was still in good condition. The cable is still in place under the guttering, but the vinyl seems to be slipping out. We tightened the cable as far as we could. Wondered if we should have glued the vinyl in place before tensioning the cable? Think I will buy a new cable, remove the other one and start again this weekend (providing it doesn't rain!)

 

DOH! DOH! and double DOH!

[Guest XR3i-cabriolet-]

Im not shure for definate as i have yet to fit my roof but i got a new cable as although the old one LOOKs in good condition i would have thaught it would have streatched over the years

 

there is a guy on ebay who sells cables and there not expensive at all

[Guest wolfslair]

Thanks I will take a look