Soft top or lemans hardtop?

[Newsnake]

Mr Bruce, I have followed your work for a while, and even talked to you once a about a crazy idea about a Zagato roadster. I didn't want to bother you until I decided. The wife is pushing hard for the soft top, I like the lemans top. It looks like you can have both.

If you ship it to the west coast, what does it take to complete your top. Does it require major auto body skills, or could a person with the limited skill set of a slow baboon do some of the work.

[Fullchat289]

Originally Posted by Newsnake

....The wife is pushing hard for the soft top, I like the lemans top. It looks like you can have both.

If you ship it to the west coast, what does it take to complete your top. Does it require major auto body skills, or could a person with the limited skill set of a slow baboon do some of the work.

Yes, you can have both. But here's one argument towards the Lemans HT for you to present to the better half. The fuel filler is going to be "inside" the convertable top because of the location on the rear deck. This presents a challenge when fueling, and also I've heard from some FIA drivers that they get some fuel smell inside the car when driving with the top up. Benefit is that the erector set can be disassembled and stowed in the trunk as others have stated. But you see.....you already screwed up by choosing a car that doesn't have the fuel filler on the rear fender....

Anywho...back to the other question about what it takes to finish the top. When Brucey gets done with it, it's a beautiful piece.. Bruce leaves plenty of material to achieve a nicely finished look at the back window opening, the rear deck interface, and the side window/windscreen areas. Here are some photos of what the top looked like fresh from the mold as we were trimming the rear deck interface to fit my car. I will follow these photos by a brief run-down of the "post processing" operations to get the top finished.. here's the photos:









OK, here's the brief run-down of the "post processing" ops...

1. Trim rear of top to lay nicely on the rear deck of your car..(Bruce's trim lines closely match the contour of the original FIA body shape, so if your Unique has any deviation, some trimming will be required - not a big deal...just takes some patience)
2. Make some brackets to attach the top to the furrels behind your seats that accept the main soft-top bow. (See the link Bruce provided to view what I did)
3. Make some "T-bolts" for attaching the top to the front screen. (See the link Bruce provided to view what I did)
4. Make a plexi window for the rear opening. (See the link Bruce provided to view what I did)
5. Source a rear deck seal and misc. fixings from McMaster-Carr.

Now since Unique sells a Lemans HT for their FIA car, I would take a short-cut and see what it would cost you to source the fuel filler modification solution from them. If you are so inclined, you may also want to source a split trunklid from them as well so you can continue to use your trunk. (I don't have this part finished on my car just yet) If sourcing these bits from Unique is cost prohibitive, then add these two items to the list above. I can assist you if you get stuck on the fuel filler thing. I also have an excel sheet with the sources for where I got my extra parts to finish the top and you can see all my Lemans HT related photos here:

FIA HardTop pictures by Fullchat289 - Photobucket

- Allen.