Pagoda SL Group
W113 Pagoda SL Group => Body, interior, paint, chrome, and cosmetic items => Topic started by: Tomnistuff on April 17, 2021, 23:28:43
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Do these two photos look reasonable to fit together properly when I install the Hardtop on the car? I am assuming that the small rectangular tab at the end of the Hardtop Front Seal is bent over to fill the gap by the contour of the chrome windshield frame when the top is installed on the windshield frame.
Does anyone have a couple of photos that show how it should look when the seals are in the proper positions? Any advice anyone can offer will be appreciated. By the way, I have inverted the hardtop photo to show the seals in the proper orientation for installation like the top of the A-pillar is. I also assume that I must trim the seal ends to the same angle so they fit against one another. I also saw somewhere that the hollow seals should be filled with RTV rubber so that water does not enter.
Tom Kizer
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I found this photo. Maybe it will help.
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It's sure better than anything I've seen before. I should have anticipated my question and photographed mine before I disassembled it for restoration. I only photographed the windshield and top separately, not assembled like yours.
I can't quite see the tab on the front hardtop seal, but I suspect that the front seal tab, the hardtop side seal and the A-pillar seal top end all meet and get squished together when the door closes. That would, I think, yield your photo.
Thanks very much. I'll keep plugging based on the confidence your photo gives me and I'll know for sure when I install the hardtop.
Tom Kizer
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That picture is of a fellow members car that I used to do my new seals.
I seem to remember that both the A pillar and hard/soft top seals were compound cuts.
I had the original seals for reference but didn’t trust due to age. It was an iterative process, cutting just a little at a time and checking fit.
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If I may: you also have to remember that the soft top needs to fit as well. This determines trimming of the A-pillar seals, you need to be very careful there and make a lot of trials of fit of both tops.
As for the A-pillar seals, if you buy them new, you will need to cut them a bit as they are most likely too long. Then you can use the rubber plug from one of them to fill the hole in the top (they are not left and right, one end is plugged by factory, one of them goes upside down and the plugged end will be cut - you take the filling rubber piece from there).
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Mrfatboy’s photo is my car.
Install the A-pillar seal with the door open. Leaving it long on the bottom. The bottom should be your last cut after you are happy with the top. This way if you mess up the top cut a bit you have extra material to play with by sliding the seal up. The top cut of the a-pillar seal is only very slightly altered from its original cut to follow the top seal. Most of the trimming was made to the hard top window seal.
The little ear hanging down off of the hardtop front seal can be glued back into the extra space that is left over between the hardtop upper glass seal and its c-channel. I used a couple little dabs of contact cement. (Photo below)