Removing sunroof....FOR GOOD

[Winston]

Its heavy

It pisses water all over the passengers

It has to GOOOOOOO!!!!!!!


Does it add any strength to the roof? Is it a simple as removing it and replacing it with perspex or ally etc etc

Thanks, Winston

[richy]

i actually thought about taking mine out and having a new full skin fitted but kinda mess's up a williams 3 then!

suppose all u have to do is bolt down a peice of perspex or whatever to it if u wanted, always a way

[Martin]

I wanna get rid too but want a tidy job....wondering if the local bodyshop might be able to sort it...?

[Mark_Ritchspeed]

Its not as quick and straightforward as you think. We use a very strong adhesive for bonding a metal plate to the inside of the roof. Perspex or ally would look crap and you would lose strength in the roof at the same time.

For plating sunroofs we use a high grade, high strength metal adhesive (same as Lotus use for bonding chassis) to literally stick a steel plate underneath the roof overlapping the sunroof hole. Its not cheap and quite difficult to source for the right stuff. You then skim over the top with filler and paint.

Once its bonded the join is as strong as a weld, but if you get your plate lined up wrong or it slips during curing, your totally screwed as it wont come off again.

A decent bodyshop should be able to do it, but make sure its the right strength/grade bonding adhesive as you only get one chance.

Done properly it puts a fair bit of extra strength into the roof.

[Winston]

Cheers for clearing that up

Any chance of a rough price and some pics of yours pls

Think it will have to go on the future bodywork list :evil:

[Winston]

In fact forget the pics....I'll come and have a look at FCS :D

[Mark_Ritchspeed]

No problem. Maybe I'll even clean it this week so it can actually be seen.

[Daz]

Does it add any strength to the roof? Is it a simple as removing it and replacing it with perspex or ally etc etc


It's a major weak point having a hole in the roof.. heh. The sunroof probably holds it together massivly.
They always crease on the corners etc..

Northy took his out and he said it was quite flimsy in that area if I remember.

The best way, would to be get a Williams 1 or 2 roof and get that on.. but, that'll probably be quite expensive.
A bit of perspex would look a bit rally, but, I'm guessing it'll be even weaker then!

(or, do what Mark says.. and get some strength back, hehehe)

[Mark_Ritchspeed]

The roof is very flimsy, which is why you cant really weld it. Well, you could, but no matter how careful you were with the weld it would still distort massively. This is why we bond them. At the end of the day, the proper adhesive is used to bond the actual chassis for Lotus Elises etc so is massively strong and is stronger than a proper weld according to the suppliers.

Mine was done over a year ago and hasnt cracked or warped at all since being done. Having said that mine does have a very substantial roll cage in which will cut down on a bit of the shell flex anyway.

[2 live]

or jus go to a scrappies n get a complete roof off an unsunroofed clio....then get it cleaned up n see if u can find a bodyshop to pull ur roof panel off n replace with the 1 from the scrappy

[Daz]

Or, forget a roof and have a WilliamsCC - the roof must weigh a loads! :shock: :lol:

[u33db]

Is there not strengthening beams or the like on non sunroofed clios? When i removed the heading on my old one to do the seals there was defintely some kind of thin spars running between the roof and lining...

[VIPERONE]

mine has bad creases on both rear sides of sun roof....i could do with sorting it.

[richy]

or jus go to a scrappies n get a complete roof off an unsunroofed clio....then get it cleaned up n see if u can find a bodyshop to pull ur roof panel off n replace with the 1 from the scrappy

this is what i meant, take the skin off the roof and replace it with a non sunroof skin!