Well, I had to move house in the last six months and it's been manic with the boy starting a new school and decorating etc. but finally got the top done. No harm done it being in the new garage for ages.
First effort was removing the ally strips holding the canvas down. The only major issue with was reaching up to the front (short arse that I am) and 45 year old screws... Thankfully I only lost one screw to threading but think that was due to a decent impact driver rather than any skill on my part
This is where I have to object a bit to the Bentley manual. It says tie up the spring arms, so did so. But as soon as the bolts were undone, they kept moving and stopped me being able to take the roof off. So, they had to come off. Two tiny nuts and bolts but would have had to come off anyway to replace the canvas.
As I did this after going to AliveN'VBubbin I also decided to replace the perished rubber retaining strap things. Being an idiot, I didn't realise that the rear one (with the metal catch) was the same thing but with a hole drilled in it... But did carefully take photos of how the fixings worked. I thought that I'd have to go out and get new split pins, but a touch of wd40 and no problems. Bit stiff to get back in, but lubbed up and hammer time worked a treat getting them in...
So, stapled into the corners first and hay presto, all lines up nicely. Slowly worked our way round (after the OH had been back out to get the right stapes..) and it appeared ok. Time to lift it back on.
Getting the roof on was a direct reversal of the removal, but my mate had arrived by then, so v much easier. Issue was getting the bolts back into the body. Two on each side went in fine, the other two are a total no no (off to the Internet to check out how to do this. Tip on this one, get a stick to hold the roof in the right position, or face lactic acid burn in your arms as you swap bolting in duties....
So that was about a days work, by now I'd had a few too many beers and decided to put him back in the garage and wait till the following day to finish off. At this point, it took around 6 hours with two of us working at a time. Top is on, bolted on the front and happily ok to drive around it...
Following morning,'it's just me working. And the stick, with an old rag at the end. So hung over attempted to finish the work. This was a pain in the proverbial... Had to line it up twice too get it to fit. The corners were the worst bits and sooooooo tight. I had to cut the plastic to get it to bend right and getting the screws back in was an impossibility, so the drill had to come out... But after about another 5 hours work:
Ta da!!! TBH, I'm really pleased how this went. Total of 17 working hours worth of effort (or beers, old van and chatting poo). The only real error was folding the canvas over at the top, but figured that it being directly stapled to the Poptop couldn't be right... Would have given about 5mm play when attempting to refit the strips.
Hope this helps anyone else attempting this.