The MGF Register Forums

.........After owning an F/TF for a few years?

Yes. My F wears one for the winter months as it lives outside with no cover and is my daily drive.

I currently wear my hardtop as a hat. Well, it feels that way, as the headlining has almost completely separated from the headliner board and my head is propping it up!!!

Need to get a replacement - hopefully find some suitable material at Stoneleigh?

Well blow me down Rob! I got the F out for a little winter driving and also found that the headlining had become detached from the hardtop. I confess it had a few bubbles in the headline for about a year that I managed to ignore.

Lots of information on the net about fixing it. Apparently you can buy an adhesive spray so thought this would be a very nice little job when the sun is shining - if this bloody rain ever stops......

If you have a copy of FastForward Issue 26 (Summer 2012), it contains a very good "How to replace the headlining". I'll even loan out the cat

That's my plan too Patrick. Not sure of the condition of the foam though? Perhaps it can be stabilised with a spray-on adhesive?

I might have taken the hardtop off had I not broken the plastic window when storing it "safely". D'oh!!!

I remember that article well Nigel!

Will looking for some replacement material at Stoneliegh I expect

We bought ours at Stoneleigh, but could only get black (but that suits the car as the dash and seats are black ). The material and foam come as one.

Heres a hardtop thats been advertised for a while in xpower grey at £299, should look fine on any colour i recon. Its advertised as in Christchurch but I talked to the guy and its stored in Salisbury. He's had it advertised for a while so im sure he'll take an offer
http://www.gumtree.com/p/cars-vans-moto ... 1006834448

I didnt buy it as i picked one up in black with a duff headlining for £100

Thanks, but I'm not looking for one! My main F has lived outside as a daily drive for the better part of 8 winters without my ever feeling the need for a hardtop. But newbies frequently seem to have a hard top on the essential to-do list. My heater works pretty well, I love driving with the top down day or night all year round, but I wouldn't put on hats and loads of extra gear just to survive cold for the sake of top down motoring. If your car came with one, I suppose you would feel like fitting it sometimes; but I was just curious whether year round daily drivers felt the need.

Phew, and I was afraid you might change to the dark side of the hoods

The black hard top I'm wearing this season was previously owned by Darth Vader. His head shrunk, so needed a smaller hat.

My F is just an ornament until i get the head gasket fixed so not getting much motoring done at all at the moment. Ive just bought it and the hardtop came up for sale at the same time and it was like "karma" rather than being a "must have", Although i am a fan of hardtops as they have their uses.

Can't really see the point in a hard top unless it's for security reasons. I use my F all year round, mainly top-down, side windows up, wind-stop & heater if need be (the weather's less damp down here but just as cold in the winter). The only disadvantage is that I have had to resort to a wooly hat with a peak and lug flaps - being 6'2" tall the winter sun can be a right pain and the sun visors are less use than a chocolate fireguard. A wooly beanie keeps you warm but doesn't shield the eyes. If the weather is bad I leave the F in the garage and use something else.

I can see the advantages of a hard top in the UKs damp & miserable climate, but for me the hassle of removing it & storing it safely would be a bind.

My car wears a hard top for security reasons. I live in a lively town centre and the number of tatty/slashed softtops or abandoned kebabs on soft roofs largely caused when the muppetts get kicked out of the nearby pubs is commonplace. My neighbours M3 convertable got vandalised over xmas which put a damper on his otherwise festive cheer. Admittedly It's a bit of a faff to repeatedly remove it and put it back on, but worth it in my opinion. I've got the proceedure down to a fine art and probably 90% of the time when I drive it the roof is always down- it is a roadster after all!

My missus much prefers driving the car with with the hard top on- even with the windstop up and the windows up she moans that it messes her hair up! Suits me fine cos she'd only b*gger up the rear window or summink- love her to bits but she's a clumsy putz!!

It's cool having the option of having both, however if I had the luxury of a garage I'd sell the hardtop on fleabay to the highest bidder and invest some of the proceeds and get her a prada hairnet.

I suppose the happy compomise would be to put a full length webasto sunroof in the hardtop...now theres an utterly pointless mod ay

People have put sunroofs in hard tops! I have thought about it myself, but getting one that doesn't look cheap and rubbish is a challenge. Not ever seen a Webasto though!

Well I thought I would open this old thread! as the summer is running out, I thought I better get around to repairing the sagging lining in the hardtop. As Rob suspected earlier in the year, the thin layer of foam between the lining and the roof had broken down. Easy to get the foam off the roof but not really possible on the lining as it is rather fragile. Lots spray on glue and the lining was back in place.

I fear it does not look great but now I know how easy it is I am tempted to get a leather lining from B&G.

The old girl is due her service and MoT later this month but see she has only done 460 miles since the last one. Need to try harder in the coming year...

I meant to repaint my hardtop before the weather turned but it seems I'm too late.
Since buying it I have installed an MGF Mania glass window in the softtop and it really does make the hardtop unnecessary.

That said I think I will be putting the hardtop on for the winter but would really like to install gutters over the doors. (Why didn't the
factory do this???)
The headlining needs recovering as well as the previous Japanese owner replaced it with black vinyl which makes the
interior very dark and gloomy.
This may have to be my next project after my dash reno...If I can put off doing new mouldings upstairs in the house!

My new TF came with one, and after adding some touches I love her look and the hardtop
The F does not have one
Best of both worlds

i know its slightly different but the same I bought a hard top for our mx5. went the usual we want all the bits and bobs for her, already had rack on boot which was usefull at times. anyway back to my point, spent allot of money on the catches to fit it and the hard top, got it painted and put it on. we found with the hard top we had more wind noise than without, more leaks even tho we set it up as instructions, more creaking, couldn't go topless at a moments notice like you can with soft top, a pain to take off and you have to find somewhere safe to store it. only advantage over security was it had a large rear glass window which gave you nice vision but obviously not as much as we do with roof down. now we have the f we are deffo not investing.