Sunroof / non sunroof / headliner questions

Wil Ferch · 09-18-2010, 09:42 AM

Gang:

I have a future project car in mind and would like pics /advice on the following:

1.)Does anyone have pics of a functioning sunroof from inside the car without headliner? How does all this working sunroof mechanism stuff look exposed?

2.) How bad a job is it to lose the sunroof and weld it shut? I see most do a non-sunroof roof clip replacement because of the difficulty. What are the options here?

3.) Can you remove OEM headliner cleanly ( w/o being or looking like a kludge job) while keeping windows and window trim in-place? I'm not asking about re-installing headliner, which is commonly a windows-out proposition....just asking about taking it out and ending up with a bare roof.

TIA

ossiblue · 09-18-2010, 06:33 PM

Wil,

One thing to note is that behind the headliner the entire roof, from behind the opening to near the rear windshield, is covered by a pan. I assume you are trying to get down to only the "skin" of the outer roof, is that correct? If so, that means cutting out the pan which is not too difficult a task. If done properly, nearly all the sunroof structure comes with it--including the areas where the rails and wind deflector are located. Simply stripping out the headliner leaves all the exposed sheet metal of the pan and the attendant lack of headroom.

Wil Ferch · 09-19-2010, 04:05 AM

L.J ....that is interesting. Anyone have pics of this pan area?. Is this "pan" welded in place ( as it seems from your description if you need to "cut" it out as you say).. or is it somehow fastened with removable fasteners ( screws?).

Lastly....any more on the question about if you can remove the headliner vinyl material while keeping windows in-place?

Thanks, all......

ossiblue · 09-19-2010, 07:08 AM

Wil,

Here's a picture I found in the archives:

You can see the sunroof panel easily because it's green, the rest of what you see is the aforementioned pan. If you look closely, you can see tabs along the edges of the pan structure. Cutting these, or simply popping the spot welds, will release most of the pan. There is a portion running the width of the front opening where the outer roof skin folds down and is spot welded to the pan. This too can be cut away but is a bit more than a tab. Once the pan is gone, all "clutter" for the roof mechanism is gone and you're down to the outer skin.

The picture also shows the headliner remnant along the front windshield. As you can see, it overlaps considerably the lip that is covered by the seal and there are some metal clip fasteners. Careful cutting with a utility knife could allow you to remove the headliner without removal of the front and rear windows--it you want to try that.

Hope this helps.

Wil Ferch · 09-19-2010, 10:34 AM

Thank you for finding this....can you recall the thread in the archives that this came from? Not a biggie as you have answered my questions....just thought to ask. Is the sunroof motor somewhere "up there" near the back?

ossiblue · 04:24 PM

Wil,

I found this in the "For Sale" forum after searching "sunroof clip" (in quotes). Not much else on that particular post and I stopped searching the remaining threads after finding this shot.

The motor is mounted against the pan at the left rear--just out of the picture--and is accessible via the zippered opening in the headliner. If you look back there you'll see it along with the electrical connectors, transmission, and guide tubes. They are all bolted to the pan (except the wires, of course) so if the pan is removed it all comes with it.

If you need more pics, try the search words I posted, and try the Technical forum as well. I'm sure you'll eventually find a pic of whatever you need.

BTW, all this information is based on a factory installed sunroof. I don't know what car you have but some early cars had dealer installed sunroofs (Golde, I believe) that look similar but are no longer made. They had the motor in front and you can tell one because the interior roof line along the sunroof opening does not run straight across the width of the opening. Rather, there is a "bump out" at the middle of the front edge of the opening--that's where the motor is located. You probably have a factory sunroof but I thought I'd point this out because I don't know how these dealer installed roofs look under the headliner or if they have a pan or not.

Wil Ferch · 09-19-2010, 06:30 PM

Thanks, L.J......the extra info was much appreciated.

Bill Verburg · Bill Verburg's Garage

here's another one, this is off a 993

Wil Ferch · 09-20-2010, 06:25 AM

Jeepers... I see the 2 tabs that you gotta break that LJ talked about and showed with his photos....but do you also have to break thru the ~ 32 spot welds on the leading edge that are now more visible in Bill's red example? I can't quite reconcile where that is when looking at these 2 sets of photos....are they accessable or hidden under yet another panel that folds-over the spot weld area? I'd like to know how difficult a job this ends up being and how much of the remaining car is affected.

ossiblue · 07:31 AM

Wil,

Bill's shot is an excellent example of replacing the sunroof clip. All the spot welds along the front edge are accessible once the windshield and headliner are removed, I believe. You asked in your original post about closing the opening or replacing the roof clip. If replacing the clip, the body experts I've spoken to prefer to do it the way shown in Bill's picture--notice the cuts around the entire roof clip. The clip is not cut at the pillars but rather along the perimeter of the rain gutters and just above the front and rear windshields. The pictures of the cut pillars in another thread explain the difficulty of reconstructing a structurally sound roof once the pillars have been cut (Interchanging roofs). It can be done, but only by an experienced unibody welder.

There are other threads on simply welding the panel into the hole, which you can search for. Replacing the clip is not uncommon but is more difficult than simply cutting the pillars and re-welding on a new one.

Edit: If you look closely at the photo I posted, the front spot welds would be along the very thin edge in the upper left-hand corner of the photo. They are covered by the edge of the headliner and, therefore, the windshield seal.

Wil Ferch · 09:37 AM

I think I may have mis-communicated . Let me try again. Removing the panel closest to one's head removes the sunroof mechanism, right?...and apparently leaves a "hole" in the true outside roof surface. To only get this far.....do you remove the tabs along the panel edges only? I think you are otherewise saying for me to remove the sunroof mechanism AND the outer roof skin to allow replacement of the outer skin with a non-sunroof outer-surface clip .....THEN I also need to drill out the 32 spot welds in the front and remove the headliner and the window....right? I think I confused the issue by blending these two questions.

So.....

.... if the object is to only remove the sunroof mechanism and still *retain* the original outer roof skin ( and retaining the "hole" into which the movable outer sunroof panel fits)...is it only a matter of cutting the various tabs around the perimeter of the pan closest to one's head...and not do the rest like drilling out spot welds and windshield removal, etc, etc.....

... I hope I'm expressing myself clearly..... sorry for dragiing this out, bit hopefully this archived answer can also help others later, depending upon how far they want to take this.

DG624 · 09-20-2010, 12:23 PM

Will I saw a post that removed the sunroof and replaced it with a hand-made roof section made in England specifically for this. A 1" lap joint fit all around the panel and allowed spot welds to secure the part before final welding. This seems to be the best and least labor intensive method for a clean roof line.

The image shows the sunroof removed except for a small amount of bracing that supported the panel before welding.

ossiblue · 09-20-2010, 04:59 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Wil Ferch

I think I may have mis-communicated . Let me try again. Removing the panel closest to one's head removes the sunroof mechanism, right?...and apparently leaves a "hole" in the true outside roof surface. To only get this far.....do you remove the tabs along the panel edges only? I think you are otherewise saying for me to remove the sunroof mechanism AND the outer roof skin to allow replacement of the outer skin with a non-sunroof outer-surface clip .....THEN I also need to drill out the 32 spot welds in the front and remove the headliner and the window....right? I think I confused the issue by blending these two questions.

So.....

.... if the object is to only remove the sunroof mechanism and still *retain* the original outer roof skin ( and retaining the "hole" into which the movable outer sunroof panel fits)...is it only a matter of cutting the various tabs around the perimeter of the pan closest to one's head...and not do the rest like drilling out spot welds and windshield removal, etc, etc.....

... I hope I'm expressing myself clearly..... sorry for dragiing this out, bit hopefully this archived answer can also help others later, depending upon how far they want to take this.

Wil,

I think it was me that may have caused some confusion by stating the picture posted by Bill was an example of a clip replacement, which it is. You do not have to go that far just to get rid of the substructure and leave a hole in the original roof to later weld closed.

To leave only the hole in the outer roof shell, you do need to remove the pan and sunroof mechanisms and that does require more than cutting a couple of tabs. The tabs hold the substructure to the body, except in the front. If you look at the front of your sunroof when open, the part that folds down from the outer skin to the substructure needs to be cut. This can be done without removing the windshield, and once the pan is cut out roughly, you can trim the sheet metal down a bit and you will have an interior underside that looks much like the one in the picture posted by DG624.

I know many on this board have removed the sunroof and welded closed the opening. Hopefully, one of them will chime in with some pictures too.

DG624 · 09-21-2010, 12:35 PM

Will, this is the post that described a panel replacement for the sunroof.

Sunroof Delete on my 3.8 Widebody Projekt Part 1

More expensive but a more complete result and less weight. You would have to contact the supplier for the panel replacement.

Wil Ferch · 09-21-2010, 02:18 PM

Great responses....just think...all of this because of Porsche-North America's *goofy* marketing scheme in the 80's that pretty much "forced" one to buy the "optional" sunroof for USA-spec cars. Allowed a lower base price that no one ever bought this way... sure, there was the sunroof "delete" option but that only allowed you to buy the car w/o the "optional" sunroof...and you had to wait X months for your car to be built instead of buying off the floor....

Oh well...rant over.....

Thanks for the links and I'll sesrch further using 'sunroof delete' , 'sunroof weled shut'... or somesuch. Thanks, all...for the patience you've shown me with this question.

DG624 · 09-21-2010, 03:49 PM

This sunroof delete should be on the 101 projects to lighten my overloaded sports car. I think I have removed about 150 lbs of stuff I never would have ordered.

Wil Ferch · 09-21-2010, 04:26 PM

Yeppers.....heated outside rearview mirrors, power mirrors....power seats.....heated seats......power windows...power sunroof... cruise control ( "Tempomat"), etc, etc...

Porsche obviously felt market pressure to keep up with the Jones's ( eh...with the BMW and Benz crowd), since Porsche was obviously in the "luxury" pricing bracket. PCNA felt they had to provide "luxury". Didn't understand the *fundamental* difference between a racing sail boat and a yacht...both expensive too.... but catering to a different crowd.

Ya coulda gotten rid of all this "junk"...... A/C...well ....even the bare-bones Ferrari F40 had A/C, so a 'working' A/C might be OK....but maybe ditch this too and give me pop-out rear windows.....

ossiblue · 09-21-2010, 04:49 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Wil Ferch

Yeppers.....heated outside rearview mirrors, power mirrors....power seats.....heated seats......power windows...power sunroof... cruise control ( "Tempomat"), etc, etc...

Porsche obviously felt market pressure to keep up with the Jones's ( eh...with the BMW and Benz crowd), since Porsche was obviously in the "luxury" pricing bracket. PCNA felt they had to provide "luxury". Didn't understand the *fundamental* difference between a racing sail boat and a yacht...both expensive too.... but catering to a different crowd.

Ya coulda gotten rid of all this "junk"...... A/C...well ....even the bare-bones Ferrari F40 had A/C, so a 'working' A/C might be OK....but maybe ditch this too and give me pop-out rear windows.....

...and bring back the opening front vent windows along with them!