Cabriolet top replacement

[expat]

Hey 83sc euro cab - how did you fair with the convertible top replacement you were doing?

Did you finish it - any pictures and details.

I need to do this in the next month before the rain starts here.

Anyone else done this recently? - I know you did Kurt, some time ago though.

Cheers
Mark

[Kurt B]

I'm now of the opinion that 3rd party tops will not work for 83,84 and maybe 85 cars hassle-free.

Porsche has always maintained the tops didn't change until the 993, but since the cars have been custom built especially the cab tops, small changes must have occurred and all of the 3rd party makers are using the same pattern--one for a later car I suspect that was slightly different in the rear portion.

When someone from here had a professional do it (don't remember his name), the pro ran into exactly the same problems the other guy you mentioned and I did: the rear window sags. If you pull the under lip below the rear semi-circle hold down bar all the way, it's still not tight enough. The pro found this out too.

I think the early top frame settings are narrower or something, so you're going to have to screw around with the rod adjustments.

[Steve W]

I was that guy Kurt mentioned that had my top done last December. I dropped it off at a shop that supposedly did many Porsches and fabricated their own tops for them using all original materials. I expected to pick it up the next day, only to go not get it back for a month and a half. The problem is that the rear window kept having a big loose wrinkle at the sides of the plastic rear window which the could not get out no matter how they pulled it. I have a '84 and they maintain that the 83-84 cars are slightly different from the later frames. However GAHH, a large manufacturer of convertible tops disagrees. I have seen a GAHH top on an 83 and there were no wrinkles in the rear window, however, they only make one style - narrow - window, and the bottom edge of the canvas where the front half meets the rear half did not line up perfectly, by 3/8 of an inch. Robbin's Auto Tops also does not seem to be aware of any frame differences, however they acknowledged that back when they did installations, they on occasion did some unethical hack and restitch techniques to get a top to fit.

The shop that did mine, took so long, because they went through four iterations of top patterns until they got it right. It was the shop owner's personal challenge to figure out what the problem was, and create the master pattern for all future cars like mine. Nice guy - their shop supposedly does the custom upolstery work for Gemballa too.

[rickeolis]

A company out of California named 'Straman' does these for a living with all high-end cars; Ferrari, Porsche, Vette, etc.