Surrey soft top sits high

[Neilson]

Hi all, finally got round to fitting soft top, but seems to sit high in the middle. Nuts on rear rods are set back to the furthest point so no leeway there.

is this how they sit, or is there something simple I can do to rectify?

Thanks

 

[harlequin]

How does it look over the side windows, is it parallel or is there a high point/gap in the middle?I must say it looks nice and taunt with no stretch wrinkles.

George 

[Neilson]

43 minutes ago, harlequin said:

How does it look over the side windows, is it parallel or is there a high point/gap in the middle?I must say it looks nice and taunt with no stretch wrinkles.

George 

Hi George, I’d say it sits above the top of the window glass by 2”.

The hood itself is extremely taught, a really great fit. I did contemplate cutting the threaded bar at the rear by an inch, to hopefully make it sit lower?

Don’t know how why the images are sitting upside down, ha!

Neil

Edited July 17, 2025 by Neilson

[stuart]

Is that on a clamped header rail? Did you fit the hood to the header rail? If so by trimming the rear of the frame yes it will sit lower but the cover will go slack.

Stuart.

[Neilson]

15 minutes ago, stuart said:

Is that on a clamped header rail? Did you fit the hood to the header rail? If so by trimming the rear of the frame yes it will sit lower but the cover will go slack.

Stuart.

Hi Stuart, that’s correct. I won’t do that then 👍
I don’t think it look too bad, but wanted to check whether people thought it sat too high.

Edited July 17, 2025 by Neilson

[RogerH]

[RogerH]

Hi Neil

do not cut anything until you have thought about it.

If you shorten the frame then it will just be limp. 

It will need the fabric trimming so that the frame can then be held against it and become tight

Big job

 

Roger

[Tim T]

Not the best photo but mine is much the same. Frame from TR Shop with a clamped header rail. Will take a better pic next time the surrey is on.

Cheers,

Tim

PS you will perhaps notice only one one Tex wiper arm!!

Edited July 17, 2025 by Tim T

[harlequin]

Does your backlight look to be a little bit forward? From your photo the front edge looks to be beyond the front of the wing by 10 mm

George  

[Drewmotty]

Mine was like Oblio’s hat too. I shortened the frame and re made the front joint to the header rail to suit. 

[Neilson]

57 minutes ago, RogerH said:

Hi Neil

do not cut anything until you have thought about it.

If you shorten the frame then it will just be limp. 

It will need the fabric trimming so that the frame can then be held against it and become tight

Big job

 

Roger

Thanks Roger, appreciate the advice, I was ready to get the angle grinder out, but I’m going to live with it as it’s not too bad 👍

[Neilson]

32 minutes ago, Tim T said:

Not the best photo but mine is much the same. Frame from TR Shop with a clamped header rail. Will take a better pic next time the surrey is on.

Cheers,

Tim

PS you will perhaps notice only one one Tex wiper arm!!

Hi Tim, that’s does look similar to mine. I’m about 2” from the top of the window to the middle press stud. Be interested when you have time to see some extra images.

Thanks

Neil

[Neilson]

34 minutes ago, harlequin said:

Does your backlight look to be a little bit forward? From your photo the front edge looks to be beyond the front of the wing by 10 mm

George  

Hi George, it certainly does in that image.

I’ll take a close look tomorrow and report back 👍

[Neilson]

28 minutes ago, Drewmotty said:

Mine was like Oblio’s hat too. I shortened the frame and re made the front joint to the header rail to suit. 

Thanks for the advice, I’ll look into this at a later stage👍

[stuart]

18 hours ago, Neilson said:

Hi Stuart, that’s correct. I won’t do that then 👍
I don’t think it look too bad, but wanted to check whether people thought it sat too high.

You have got the H frame front rods into the corner holes I take it?

This is what the material should sit like 

Stuart.

 

Edited July 18, 2025 by stuart

[Neilson]

2 hours ago, stuart said:

You have got the H frame front rods into the corner holes I take it?

This is what the material should sit like 

Stuart.

 

Hi Stuart, that’s correct. You very kindly fabricated the frame for me with the TR6 header rail 👍

Yours looks absolutely perfect!

After much head scratching, I decided to take 10mm of each of the threaded rods, and now they sit in the Surrey back with no thread showing and it’s made a difference.

The hood was extremely tight, but doing this has made it much easier to fit and still seems pretty tight all round. I don’t think I can get much better than this apart from bending the middle section of the H frame down.

Probably best not to do this! 
Neil

Edited July 18, 2025 by Neilson

[RogerH]

[Neilson]

1 minute ago, RogerH said:

Thanks Roger! 👍

[stuart]

53 minutes ago, RogerH said:

 

50 minutes ago, Neilson said:

Thanks Roger! 👍

Can also see that the nearside sits higher but thats your screen frame leaning backwards more on that side. have you got the clips fitted for the inner draught excluder section to clip to as that will help.to pull it down a bit as the frames are very flimsy.

Stuart.

[Neilson]

14 minutes ago, stuart said:

 

Can also see that the nearside sits higher but thats your screen frame leaning backwards more on that side. have you got the clips fitted for the inner draught excluder section to clip to as that will help.to pull it down a bit as the frames are very flimsy.

Stuart.

Hi Stuart, clips are fitted, but no hooks on window frame and Surrey back. 
They’re currently on order from the TR Shop.

Neil

[Malbaby]

On 7/18/2025 at 3:32 AM, harlequin said:

Does your backlight look to be a little bit forward? From your photo the front edge looks to be beyond the front of the wing by 10 mm

George  

I had to do the something similar on my project car to ensure better sealing of the vertical rubber to the door glass.

[Phil Read]

With all that sunshine i would just leave it off.

[TR4Tony VC]

Hi

I think the issue is that you have a reproduction Surrey top frame. The bars are not gently curved (enough) in comparison to the original, so the peak of the roof sits higher and the sides don’t fall toward the windows in the outer 3rd of the side bar. The upshot is that the roof is very ‘peaky’.

The only thing you can do to correct this is to gently rebend the bars, keeping the lengths the same and therefore the fit of the Surrey top itself good - I’ve done this with a couple of wooden blocks in a vice, but it’s tricky to get right and hard not to damage the paint, so you need to wrap the bars in cloth and tape and do the four front to back bars first, then the outer two.

Regards 

Tony 

[Neilson]

3 hours ago, Phil Read said:

With all that sunshine i would just leave it off.

Absolutely, just want to be prepared for the flash thunderstorms haha!

[stuart]

17 hours ago, TR4Tony VC said:

Hi

I think the issue is that you have a reproduction Surrey top frame. The bars are not gently curved (enough) in comparison to the original, so the peak of the roof sits higher and the sides don’t fall toward the windows in the outer 3rd of the side bar. The upshot is that the roof is very ‘peaky’.

The only thing you can do to correct this is to gently rebend the bars, keeping the lengths the same and therefore the fit of the Surrey top itself good - I’ve done this with a couple of wooden blocks in a vice, but it’s tricky to get right and hard not to damage the paint, so you need to wrap the bars in cloth and tape and do the four front to back bars first, then the outer two.

Regards 

Tony 

Yes Ive had to do that just to make them even look vaguely correct or it looks like a bell tent and wont go anywhere near the centre of the top of the window..

Stuart.