Roof Fitting

[cjdad76]

Couple of questions about the roof on my Westfield:

 

1) The plastic seating strip that fits onto the top of the windscreen is in 2 pieces - is this normal?

2) Are most roof's only attached to the windscreen with the 2 poppers at each corner?

3) Does everyone's roof bend up in the middle and threaten to blow off at anything over 50mph??

 

I'm guessing the 2 piece strip allows easier folding / storage, but I'm wondering whether a single piece would stop the roof bending up in the middle?

[SootySport]

1.   It is supplied as a single piece,  although it is easier to fold and store off the car when in 2 pieces. It is fragile and will break sometime.

2.   Yes a popper in each corner and some sort clip in the middle. I'm not sure what the original looks like but mine is a rivnut in the screen frame, and an ally clamp with a thumbscrew to hold the clamp on.

3.   I've never driven my car with a roof but I guess the centre clip will hold the roof better.

[CrisisWolf]

1. Mine is a single piece.

2. Its an L Hook/Clip in the middle and then poppered on the corners.

3. Drove mine on the motorway home (and it rained at the end of the journey) and can't say I noticed.

[6carjon]

Hi Chris. I think it is fair to say the cars roof reflects the 1950s design and performance even if the car is somewhat faster now. My roof was as you describe split and attached with poppers as described. It gave up at 70mph. I think you should get better than 50mph. Do your doors lift at bottom at speed increasing the pressure in the cockpit ? Most users with weather equipment swear by half hoods. I don't use weather gear anymore but can recommend rigid half doors. These keep lots of wind and rain outside the cockpit and its only when you stop that you get wet....

Hope someone can show a good photo for ensuring your roof is properly assembled to give it best chance.

[cjdad76]

Well, from the replies above, it looks like I'm missing the clip in the centre.  This coupled with the plastic strip being split in the middle is the problem.

 

There is a rivnut in the centre of the windscreen, albeit on my car, the rear view mirror is screwed into it.  This has never been secured as the thread in the rivnut is no good, so it waggles around uselessly.  A stick on replacement.will solve the rear view mirror issue and free up the (tired) rivnut for attaching the roof.

 

Any chance someone could post a pic of the centre bracket so I can look at making one up to suit?

[Rab (bombero) Reid]

Couple of questions about the roof on my Westfield:

 

1) The plastic seating strip that fits onto the top of the windscreen is in 2 pieces - is this normal?

1) It comes as one piece from Westfield but they tend to break at the point of the 'L' shaped slot - handy for storage, as stated by Soots! The centre should have a rivnut on the windscreen frame and a wingnut clamps the roof plastic 'fillet' as it's known, to the windscreen.

2) Are most roof's only attached to the windscreen with the 2 poppers at each corner?

2) Yes but earlier types might have poppers right along retrofitted by a previous owner.

3) Does everyone's roof bend up in the middle and threaten to blow off at anything over 50mph??

3) By correctly using the Westfield hood frame, the roof should be slightly 'peaked' just above your head. Some 'bowing' or 'ballooning' still occurs.

 

I'm guessing the 2 piece strip allows easier folding / storage, but I'm wondering whether a single piece would stop the roof bending up in the middle?

[Rab (bombero) Reid]

Well, from the replies above, it looks like I'm missing the clip in the centre.  This coupled with the plastic strip being split in the middle is the problem.

 

There is a rivnut in the centre of the windscreen, albeit on my car, the rear view mirror is screwed into it.  This has never been secured as the thread in the rivnut is no good, so it waggles around uselessly.  A stick on replacement.will solve the rear view mirror issue and free up the (tired) rivnut for attaching the roof.

 

Any chance someone could post a pic of the centre bracket so I can look at making one up to suit?

Get yourself a stick-on rear view mirror and an M4 (I think) wingnut .. actually wing-bolt. I think you'll have to fabricate this by simply taking a wingnut and standard bolt with the hex cut off and bond the hex-less bolt into the nut .. .. if that makes sense!

[Stuart]

Chris the clip in the centre is actually just an L-shaped cutout in the plastic strip.  You can just about see it here. The bottom of the L broke off on mine so I used some proper glue to fix a piece of black plastic over it - with a hole in for a grub screw into the rivnut.  Methinks you need to do similar to bond the 2 halves of your strip together - either that or get a new strip from the factory.  My hood has been used at good motorway speeds no problem.