Raising Rear of Front Shell

[Les Fellows]

I need to replace the wood bow on the upper back edge of the front shell and replace the bag seal all the way around. Is there some info on lifting the rear of the shell so it clears the back. I only need about a 4" lift and assumed you detach the rear shell from the rear torsion arm and then lift it to clear with the front arms intact. Any suggestions would be helpful. I will remove the a/c pedestal as some spread a few tubes of sealant around it to try and stop the water leak created by the sagging roof edge. I plan to clean it up and then re-bed the pedestal in a moderate amount sealant, What sealant would you folks recommend?

[Bill]

Four inches is a lot of lift. I doubt that there is that much "slack" in the white lift arms.

Why do you need to replace the wood bow? Is it rotted? Does the rear edge of the front shell still have the original arch? Does it match the arch of the front edge of the rear shell? Or has the roof sagged until the edge is straight or even sagged?

Do you need to raise the front shell only once, simply to be able to close the rear shell during the rework? Or are you looking to raise it 4" permanently?

I'm not quite getting the picture.

Bill

[Les Fellows]

Hey Bill,

The bow is broken and in all probability rotted. I removed the A/c unit this morning and read to raise the rear of the shell to gain access to the stapes retaining the bag seal towards the bottom sides. I have the front shell up and the rear one down with a scaffold above it to stand on. The sag on the rear shell with the a/c in place was over 2".

[Wavery]

Originally Posted by Les Fellows

I need to replace the wood bow on the upper back edge of the front shell and replace the bag seal all the way around. Is there some info on lifting the rear of the shell so it clears the back. I only need about a 4" lift and assumed you detach the rear shell from the rear torsion arm and then lift it to clear with the front arms intact. Any suggestions would be helpful. I will remove the a/c pedestal as some spread a few tubes of sealant around it to try and stop the water leak created by the sagging roof edge. I plan to clean it up and then re-bed the pedestal in a moderate amount sealant, What sealant would you folks recommend?

You can't disconnect the lift arms with the roof in the down position. When the roof is down, the torsion bars are loaded. They are relaxed in the up position.

It would be best to work on the bag seal and AC with the roof from a scaffold, in the "all the way up" position.

[Les Fellows]

So can you unbolt the rear of the front shell from it's torsion arms and lift it up?
What sealant is best to re-bed the a/c pedestal?
I plan on replacing the bag seal cover with Sunbrella Fabric, but not sure how thick the foam need be, is it 2"?

Thanx for all the advise.


Les

[Wavery]

Originally Posted by Les Fellows

So can you unbolt the rear of the front shell from it's torsion arms and lift it up?
What sealant is best to re-bed the a/c pedestal?
I plan on replacing the bag seal cover with Sunbrella Fabric, but not sure how thick the foam need be, is it 2"?

Thanx for all the advise.


Les

You can unbolt the rear arms under tension if you can figure out a way to to restrain them from flipping up. If you do figure out a way, you may have one heck of a time aligning it to bolt it back together. The recommended way to unbolt those arms is in the "UP" position where there is no tension on the arms.

Maybe Shane will have some input on that. He has removed a number of roofs for various reasons.

Now, Sunbrella fabric, I have a lot of experience with as I used to own a marine custom canvas business. I built everything that you can think of (for boats) out of Sunbrella. The thing to be aware of is that Sunbrella chafes easily. Everywhere that the Sunbrella touches a surface that moves (which the bags do) the fabric will wear through in a short time.

[Bill]

Originally Posted by Les Fellows

So can you unbolt the rear of the front shell from it's torsion arms and lift it up?

Yes, I believe that you can, and I admit I don't see any other way to do what you need to do. The front shell must be raised all the way to do it.

You would raise the shell all the way, then support its rear edge using some crosswise support under both sides to keep it level. Once fully supported, undo the four bolts on each side, the ones that hold the ends of the torsion bars in the bottom of the lift arms. Now lift both sides of the shell straight up, probably using bottle jacks under both sides of the cross-support member. As you raise the shell, the ends of the lift arms should come off the ends of the torsion bars. They may be sticky, reluctant to slip out, even with the bolts removed. If so, the solution is to raise the shell a bit, then take a rubber mallet and belt the inside curve of the torsion bar downward, to help it come out.

Here is where it gets tricky.

Since the entire front shell has been lifted all the way, there should be no tension remaining in the torsion bars, and their ends should point straight up. The key word here is SHOULD. If there is any tension at all left in the torsion bars, it will be hard to pull the lift arms off their ends. More important, once you get the lift arms off, the ends of the torsion bars will spring a bit away from the straight-up position. When you go to re-assemble things, you will need to force the ends of the torsion bars back to the straight-up position, so that the lift arms can drop back onto them. Before you start, give some thought to how you would do this.

I haven't done this. I know that a few of our members have, and I expect others to chime in. One tip we have heard is to mark the initial position of the torsion bar where it slides into the lift arm. When you re-assemble, this will be your starting position.

Bill

[Bill]

Shane, didn't you have some pictures of this operation being done on your TM at the factory? Please join the discussion.

Bill

[Shane826]

Stand by, Houston. I’ll join the fray later tonight after the second job teaching the next generation of auto mechanics.

[Les Fellows]

That makes perfect sense. If I have trouble on the re-alignment, I should be able to reduce the tension on the rear torsion arms then re-adjust them once the shell is back down.
Ok no go on the Sunbrella, so would a high quality marine grade naugahyde be the ticket for the bag seals?