Replacing sunroof

#1

I hope I am not beating a dead horse with this but here it goes. After you pull the sunroof out and you go to fill in the hole, can you lay a peice of sheet metal over the hole and rivet it in? The rules state it needs to be flush with the roof line. I see there are a few people that have done that and I would like to know if it is ok. I would hate to drill all the holes and get it done just to find out that it doesn’t meet spec. Any help ?

#2

Yea, that is fine.

#3

Age wrote:

[quote]Yea, that is fine.[/quote]Thanks

#4

Can you use aluminum to cover it?

#5

From what I’ve seen carter post on in the past, when you replace the sunroof panel you have to use similar material to OE so its has to be steel

#6

9.3.13.25. The sunroof cassette mechanism may (3.1) be removed so long as a
replacement panel is either securely sealed (welded/bonded) or secured in place with
retaining clips as specified in the CCR.
9.3.13.25.1. The panel shall (3.1) be flush with the roofline and of the same material
as original (3.3).

I HAD the rivited panel but was called out in this forum under the preceeding rules.
It DOES NOT MEET THE RULE OF HAVING TO BE FLUSH WITH THE ROOF LINE.

#7

it meets the 50/50 definition of flush :wink:
There is 0 competitive advantage to riveting a panel on top as long as it is steel.

#8

Do we have any pictures of the "secured in place with retaining clips" approach? What would be the best way to do that? Maybe screw in some sheetmetal straps or perhaps weld them in?

#9
#10

Too bad you can’t delete a post that is goobered up like this.

#11

Clips-

I did this. I regret doing this. I recommend you don’t do this. I bolted aluminum strips on because I was in a time crunch to make an event. It looks fair to poor.

#12

Thanks Jamie, that’s good info.

Everyone: Can I remove the motor and that part of the sunroof cassette that does not hold the sunroof in? I was thinking that maybe I could just leave a little bit of the cassette in…the part that is clearly holding the sunroof in place. Will this work, or does removal of the motor and drive mechanism cause the roof piece to become loose within the cassette?

Everytime I see that sunroof cassette it grates on me. But I’d just as soon not rivet on sheetmetal nor do the redo the roof with bondo and paint.

#13

depending upon how tall you are, it is good to get rid of the whole sunroof and cassette so the cage can hug the roof better. That’s why I went with the riveted skin.
cheers,
bruce

#14

IMO, if you remove sunroof motor sunroof panel will become loose. Beside motor there are slides and cables in there (that can also be removed) so if you just remove the motor, sunroof might feel tight but there isn’t anything that is keeping it in place. You can leave sunroof in place and use couple of stripes (per CCR) to secure panel in place. Leave waterstriping in place and you don’t have to use bondo, just rivet two stripes. Not pretty per se, but easy, effective and legal

#15

Attached is a doc from an E36 buddy. Doc describes an approach to removing the cassette and anchoring the sunroof with clips. The clips are attached to the sunroof panel using JBWeld, instead of piercing the roof with screws or rivets. Is this do-able for us?

Ok, file won’t attach. Copying text in below instead.

  1. Remove the complete sunroof assembly from the car.

  2. Remove the sunroof panel from the cassette

  3. Separate the inner panel from the outerskin of the sunroof. I did this by taking a cutting wheel and cutting the inner panel about .5" from the lip, and then took a hacksaw blade and cut through the bonding material used to attach the inner and outer panels together.

  4. Take 1/8"x1" flat stock steel (about 2’ long) and cut into 2" pieces - braces (make 8 of them).

  5. Drill a 3/16" hole at each end of the braces.

  6. Attach the braces using the original screws used to hold the cassette to the roof. Use the existing cassette holes putting two braces on each side of the opening. You will have to drill two holes into the cross-brace at the rear of the opening ( there aren’t any pre-existing holes there).

  7. Place the sunroof into the opening, sitting it on top of the braces you just attached. It will be below the roofline, so you need to push the panel up to where it’s flush with the roof and take some rough measurements of the gap between the panel and the braces.

  8. Take 1/2" aluminum round bar and cut 8 pieces based on your measurements. These are you standoffs, place them between the brace and the panel, and now your panel should be flush with your roof. You may have to do some fine tuning to get the height just right. Remove the panel when you’re done.

  9. After you are satisfied with the fit, drill and tap a 8-32" hole in the center of the standoffs.

  10. Using 8-32" machine screws, attach the standoffs to the braces. You will have to cut down the length of the screws to fit the length of the standoffs.

  11. Mix up some slow cure JB Weld and place a "dab" on top of each standoff, and place the panel in the opening. Use some weight to ensure a good bond and let sit for 24 hours. (The guy at the body shop said that there isn’t anything better on the market to bond metals together).

  12. After things have cured, unscrew the standoffs from the braces and remove the panel.

  13. Remove the felt weatherstripping from around the opening.

  14. Replace the panel and attach it to the braces. Take duct tape and temporarily tape the seam between the panel and opening from inside the car.

  15. Using 3M windshield adhesive, fill in the seam between the panel and opening. Use your finger or something to smooth the bead. Be careful about getting this on your paint - it doesn’t damage it, it’s just a PITA to get it off.

  16. You’re done! Don’t forget to put the headliner back in.

#16

Scott Gress wrote:

[quote]Attached is a doc from an E36 buddy. Doc describes an approach to removing the cassette and anchoring the sunroof with clips. The clips are attached to the sunroof panel using JBWeld, instead of piercing the roof with screws or rivets. Is this do-able for us?

  1. You’re done! Don’t forget to put the headliner back in.[/quote]

It sounds like the cassette is not removed in the above method. Cage clearance is not the issue for them since the headliner’s going back in. The cassette removal is the topic of this post:
http://spece30.com/component/option,com_kunena/Itemid,86/func,view/id,16255/catid,9/
Removing the entire cassette will allow the cage to hug the roof an inch further from your head. It is important to deal with the spot welds at the front before the aft section is broken loose or the cassette will fall down and bend your now-flimsy roof up like mine.
An alternate to the strips on the outside is to mount the strips on the inside kind of like in e36 manner. There is no place to screw to, but same concept.
That’s my 6.25 cents.

#17

Will JBWeld as the means to anchor the clips be acceptable to annual tech?

#18

no answer to the above question?? I mean it seems the whole cassette was only held in by Glue anyways so whats the harm in reattaching it with glue (JB weld)? On a different note, is there any way to notch the cassette for the cage to be fitted into it therefore hugging the top roof line instead of being limited by the cassette?? just a thought.

#19

the sunroof cassette is held in by three 3" long welded straps on each side - only the back half is "glued" in place. JB Weld would be dubious to me.

I think many want to get rid of the whole cassette because it is weight up high.
cheers,
bruce

#20

I’ve read else where that this can be a 6hr project. Tooke me 10days.

The way to make this work is to skip all my halfbaked schemes.

So here’s my tips.

  1. It’s going to be harder then you think it will be. Buy lots of cutting disks for your grinder. Some cutting disks for your drill and dremel might also be handy for tight places.

  2. You will think fondly how much easier this would have been if you’d done it prior to your cage going in.

  3. The way to get the cassette out is to use your grinder to take it out in relatively small pieces. The obvious weld locations are 2 straps and the B pillar (that’s 6 welds). The not so obvious weld points are the front and forward of the B piller. I think it worked out to 9 welds. If you try to take the cassette out in one big piece, when you tug on it some weld is going to bend the roof.

  4. When you are cutting the cassette away from the B pillar, don’t cut the B pillar. The B pillar runs across the roof under the cassette and with a little thought you can cut cassette and not pillar. If you do cut thru the B pillar, don’t bother posting a question here on the forum re. the significance of this because no one will answer.

  5. Don’t be too fanatical about removing every solitary piece of steel associated with the sunroof and cassette. You can easily tear stuff up trying to get that last 10%.

  6. Don’t bother with any scheme to put the sunroof back in and support it with clips or whatever. Each of your ideas will take an evening to execute and then unravel the next day. Your early ideas will fail because something won’t fasten to something securely enough. Each follow-on scheme iteration will be more secure yet more of a cludge. After a week of wasted evenings, the “slap a piece of steel on top” plan that seemed so inelegant 2 weeks prior, starts developing real charm.

Besides, the sunroof is heavy. If you leave it in place, you’ve not removed much weight. Replacing the sunroof with a piece of sheet steel is easier and maximizes weight loss.

  1. Note that the sunroof is not exactly square. It’s a little wider in the rear.
    Measure 4X, cut once.

  2. Painting galvanized sheet steel is not idiotproof. My 4th attempt worked. Get automotive primer and paint. Not all primers (Rustoleum) will adhere to galvanized steel. And get the primer and paint from the same company so they are more likely to play nice together. Sand the steel with 300 grit before priming. Lightly sand again after priming. After a light coat of paint, put on a heavy coat of paint that looks nice and wet.

Each layer of primer, paint and clearcoat is another opportunity to screw it up and start all over. So once it’s looking ok, resist the temptation to apply one more coat of something.

A wet sanding stone and some soapy water do a good job removing imperfections before the next coat of whatever.

Be careful removing paint imperfections before clear coating. If you wet sand the paint at this stage, you might create a small hole in the paint layer that would allow the thinner in the clearcoat to get under the paint. This will lift the paint.

In the final iteration, I bailed on the plan to apply clearcoat. I had already used up my quota of redos, so I took the safe route and called it done.

  1. Once you have the sheet steel painted, you’re home free. Riviting it in is straight-forward.