El Taller - Cambiar luneta plástico a cristal

Para aquellos que quieran deshacerse de su antiestética luneta trasera de plástico y añadir el modelo de cristal cool'05'. Sigue estas instrucciones bajo tu responsabilidad. Veo el proceso muy sencillo, especialmente cuando nunca habia hecho nada a la capota del 'MG' - pero asegúrate de leer todo antes de empezar y tienes la certeza de hacer el trabajo con garantía.

Se han dicho muchas cosas sobre como MGR cambio cosas para hacer que la luneta de cristal encajara, la verdad es que no tubieron que cambiar mucho. Realmente no son más que conocimientos básicos de bricolaje de coche. Añadí el mio de una vez en unas 3 horas (¡y sólo puede tardar eso porque el día soleado desapareció inmediatamente por una tormenta antes de que terminara de poner la capota!).

OK, ¿Por dónde empezamos? Priemro necesitamos comprar nuestra luneta de cristal... el part number de MGR que necesitas es DSL000030PDA. Si eres habil puedes conseguirlo por unos £150 (220,00 €) de distribuidores de XPart, o ¡¡incluso mejor en el viejo eBay!!

La siguiente sección explicará como quitar la antigua luneta y poner el la nueva luneta en su lugar.

La primera cosa que hacer es desinstalar la antigua luneta.
1. Desabrocha la luneta de plástico por arriba y suleta los velcros de los laterales. Pliegue lentamente hacia abajo la luneta sobre el hueco trasero suyo.
2. Levante la parte trasera de la capota abriendo los clips de retención del interior del coche y levantar el panel posterior.
3. Verá una fila de remaches a loo largo de la parte baja de la capota por detrás:
  
  Hay remaches incluso en la curva de la base como se ve en las dos siguientes imágenes.
  
  Quita todos los remaches de cada curva y después los de detrás. Esto permitirá que la estructura metálica de retención se pueda quitar. Deberías encontrar dos remaches bajo la gomaespuma de la sección curva, si es así quitalos tambien.
4. Quita la estructura metálica de retención y saca el bajo de la parte trasera de la capota y quita toda la pantalla de aqui. Ahora es el momento para limpiar todos los años de la inmundicia que ha acumulado alrededor de la base de la capota.
Ahora necesitas soltar la parte trasera de la capota de la barra del marco.
1. Lo primero necesitas es quitar cuidadosamente la tela de terciopelo de la barra del marco. Es negra y con pelo así que no puedes perderla. Encontre que aunque es más tosco, es mejor tirar desde detrás de la barra y dejarla colgando asi el cara con pelo no se pierde. Parece como si depilaras, ¡no te preocupes!
2. Aparecerán entonces unas pequeñas tuercas de nylolck que sujetan las barra al soporte metálicode la cremallera. Son tuercas de 7 mm, sin embargo necesitarás una llave fina para ellos ya que MGR en su sabiduría hizo los agujeros al final y en un sitio equivocado, asi que las turercas están MUY cerrados al final del borde de los agujeros.. ¡Ten cuidado! Detodos modos, al quitarlos ponerlos a salvo.
3. Ahora quitar la capota de la barra de atrás. Verás una fila de tornillos que sujetaban las tuercas de 7 mm. éstas están fijadas a la capota por medio de un trozo de metal incrustrado en la capota. Quitar la capota tirando y empujando la barra .... ¡es duro pero así es! Abriendo la capota ligeramente ayuda a esto.
4. A continuación desde fuera pasar la capota trasera por encima de la bara de atrás como a continuación.
5. Quita los remaches que ves.
6. Entonces en cada extremo verás dos cabezas de tornillos ocultos bajo más tela aterciopelada - desatornillarlos.
7. Ahora ya puedes quitar toda la sección de la cremallera superior como se ve a continuación. Tu puedes deshacerte de ello más tarde.
8. Apoya la nueva luneta en el suelo y marca el centro en ella y en la parte superior de la cremallera. Yo usé un lapiz como el que veis para marcar ¡que afortunadamente no se verá cuando se monte!. Ver que la nueva pieza es más corta que la vieja, ¡no necesita más velcro para el lateral!
Lo siguiente es volver a la capota.
1. Cut a slot in the Velvety material to release the straps and slide the rear of the hood backwards and the now loose rear bar forwards over the metal bit with the bolts sticking out. You will notice the strap now hangs down in a loop.
2. Peel off the velvety material from the metal cross piece. KEEP this material for later!
3. Now you need to remove the metal cross piece. Undo the bolt at either end.
4. Then gently pry the hood canvas from the cross piece. It is held by contact adhesive but to be honest by the time you are doing this the glue will have long since lost most of its stick! The most difficult bit is manoeuvring it off the bolts!
5. Now take the new zip and glue it in position on the remaining 'flap' using contact adhesive. Make sure you stick it so that it sits just at the bottom edge of the holes that used to have the bolts from the metal cross piece. Basically you want the actual zipper to JUST be below the flap edge.
  VERY IMPORTANT - MAKE SURE YOUR ZIP IS THE RIGHT WAY ROUND! THE HEAD OF THE ZIPPER SHOULD BE ON THE PASSENGER SIDE OF THE CAR WITH THE ZIP FACING INWARDS!
6. Now you need to sew the zip in. I used pale coloured angling line for this so you can see it. I would highly recommend using some kind of fishing line (soft flexible one) as it is super strong, and this part gets a lot of tugging! The actual sewing took me the best part of 2 hours as it is quite a thickness to go through. I cant stress enough how important the quality of your stitches is. This joint takes the FULL FORCE of the hood stretching!!! Take your time with this bit or you'll have problems later!
7. Once the zip is sewn in take the glass rear panel and zip it up to it. Push the rear bar as far rearwards as it will go so the straps are tight.
Back outside to the hood rear fixings.
1. Next, with the hood down but not fastened, pull the bottom of the new glass rear section down towards the rear clamping bar of the frame. This will allow you to see which of the pre cut TINY holes marry up with the centre rivet hole. Once you have decided which is the right one you can raise the rear fastening bar up a little and everything becomes easier!
2. Make sure you get the double flap of material at the bottom of the rear glass section INSIDE the car. i.e. when you put the rivets in you are riveting through the rear section, the rubber strip at the bottom AND the flap. It is designed to add strength to the joint!!!
3. Take the old metal strip you removed way back at the beginning and hold it against the rubber strip at the bottom of the rear section. The rubber is designed to go BELOW the metal strip, so it kind of wraps over the bottom edge of the strip very slightly, like a water seal.
4. Use self tapping screws to hold the bottom all together. I found this easier and certainly more useful for future removal of things!
5. Adjust the Velcro seams at the sides of the rear glass panel so that they marry up with the original Velcro on the hood. Don't worry if it seems there is a kind of open flap in this area, this is needed to allow the hood to fold!
Now from the inside clamp the rear of the frame back down again.
1. As the new hood will invariably be all tight again (as I found the rear section is what actually gets stretched and then lets your hood go slightly loose fitting ) you may find it easier to slightly lift the hood before you continue.
2. Take the velvety strip of material you saved from earlier and use it to cover the loose rear bar. You should find it fits nicely between the straps.
3. Now you need to fasten the rear clamps that hold the hood back to the rear panel. Again make sure your front hood clamps are undone for this bit, it's going to be REALLY tight otherwise!
4. If you used light coloured thread (or fishing line!) to sew the zip in as I did, which does make it easier to see your stitches, then you need to colour it black at this point so it's not unsightly. I used my trusty indelible pen 'Sharpie'!
5. Now the really fun part. Make sure the rear frame bar is back as far as it will go still. Your hood is going to be very tight indeed (a bit like when it was new!) so you'll need to use the front cross piece of the hood to PULL it downwards to clamp it. Everything is going to creak like mad at this point - don worry, unless your hood is knackered it can hold up to the strain! (I will put another disclaimer at this point to say that you have done all this at your own risk! LOL). I recommend spraying some water on the hood (just a bit!) after you have done this. It will allow the hood to settle properly, and take some of that tightness out. When you open it the next day it will feel like a new hood!
  FINISHED GLASS REAR SECTION IN ALL ITS GLORY.
Added some small 'filler patches' to the zip end areas to pull the rear section square. This was actually very easy as all I had to do was to loosen the hood, pull the rear bar forward and there was enough flex to easily allow me to sew the patches in place:
Also decided to reinforce a few 'wear areas' that are typical to the MGF y MGTF. I used the spare material that came with the rear section (this was over the entire glass area as a cover so is perfect for patching your roof as its the correct material!). As you can see all I did was to use some 'Evostik' to bind the new patches to the inside of Meg's roof panel. Worked like a treat.... Now I know that if she gets any more wear patches I have enough material to sort them out for years to come!
OK the bit I almost forgot!! I got a heated rear window switch kit from eBay and fitted it.
1. The kit came with instructions but basically you pop out a blank in the switch panel in the centre console and attach the switch to the only spare plug there as far as I can see (clearly I have no connector for front fog lights!). In the MGF Mk1 if you use a newer style centre console (like me) you will need to shave the small locating strips off the plug to make it fit the switch (or if you're like me just push a bit harder and it goes on anyway!).
2. Next add the relay to the fuse board under the steering wheel. It's the only spare relay space and is VERY tight to the lower dash panel. I removed the starter relay to get better access.
3. Then the fun part... you can either spend £20 on eBay buying an official rear loom part, or make one for pennies.... guess which I did?! Anyway, there are only two wires on the rear loom plug. You will find this if you lift the passenger side parcel shelf carpet up. Its a white plastic plug. Just use good high ampage spade connectors to attach two pieces of 30amp cable to it. At the heated rear window end use more spades (I used insulated ones). Then wrap the exposed area of cable that shows above the carpet with black tape neatly and voila: