Cantrails

[Bill Blue]

Mine won't stay in place. They work themselves away from the window, allowing leaks and creating wind noise. The situation is so bad, the rail moves enough to leave a crack between the Focus windlace and window.

Here is how the cantrail is supposed to be situated.


This is how it moves after a few miles on the road.


Careful examination will reveal that while moving inward, the rail has rotated slightly. I tried a couple of temporary fixes and decided that the physics of the retaining system are bad and coupled with worn holes and pins, leaves us with a hopeless situation.

Here is my solution.


The "fix" has yet to be road tested, but I cannot move the cantrail by wacking it with the palm of my hand, which, I must say, is a pretty good wack.

The screw is 10-32 X 1 1/2" stainless, the retainer clip is guitar pick shaped. I thought the design was pretty good, considering it does not modify anything. As a bonus, the wingnut is captured.

Bill

 

[Gary T]

Cantrail Retainer

I believe your solution will work, but I also believe the problem is really that the white plastic part with the Phillips screw as shown is broken. It is normally a U shape piece to retain the cantrail tension rod. Those parts are available if you need them.

 

[Bill Blue]

The plastic part is U shaped and contacts the end of the tension rod. You can see the end of it peeking out behind the cantrail. If the tension rod sat in the bottom of the U, I think it would work just fine. But it doesn't, it way at the top and I see no way to lower the point of contact.

The nylon piece on the other side IS broken, but that rail stays in place better than the "good" one. I think the problem is due to the looseness of the cantrail pin in the casting. That's what happens to 50 year old cars.

Bill

 

[crs]

Interesting issues and I have a comment and a question:
1. Bill, my passenger side rail seems to be more difficult to fit than the driver side. This may be due to a bent part or because the new top we installed is tighter on the passenger side; everything related to the soft top seems to work better when the sun has heated it a while. That being said, when I drove the car through a torrential rainstorm in May the only complaint was a few drops of moisture that came in over the top of the rear of the passenger window; again, possibly related to the fit of the new soft top. Interestingly, possibly due to the new boot seal from SS, the boot was dry.

2. Gary T - you said the nylon U shaped tension rod holder is available. When I tried to replace a broken one in June, SS did not have any; where do you recommend that I can find one?

 

[Gary T]

Cantrail

I saw a set of them on Ebay today in Sunbeam Alpine in Ebay Motors. I do not know the seller or have any connection.

 

[crs]

The pair of U shaped tension rod holders arrived from Ebay yesterday and I plan to replace my broken one this weekend.
Thanks for the tip.

Next, I get to figure out just why the passenger side top latch is so hard to close and fix that. There is always a reason and some amount of tinkering will usually find it.

 

[Hillman]

What series are we looking at? It doesn't look like my SII.

 

[alpine_64]

What series are we looking at? It doesn't look like my SII.

The S3-V tops

 

[snamelc]

The S3-V tops

You're right about Series II being different. It uses a twist clip on the front bow and spring clips above the B post to clip to the top frame, then flaps on the top are snapped to the cantrail. Very simple compared to III-V and has never given me any trouble. Really makes you wonder why they changed it. The difference in window shape makes it impossible to adapt the Series II cantrail to the III-V. You'd have to start from scratch.

Bill

 

[rixter]

Bill,

I am trying to learn more about your fix for the tension rod pin "creep". My right side does this more than the left, but I assumed it had to do with my bow over the windscreen being tweaked a bit. In theory, the way I understand it, the bow sockets are a distance apart such that when the tension rods are inserted, the cantrails and their seals will be pushed out for proper alignment with the top of the window glass and the quarter lights. The slight tweak in my bow I thought had effectively shortened the distance between the sockets ever so slightly. I assumed this "encouraged" the tension rods to pull in a bit over time and thus pull the tension rod pin out of it's socket in the casting. This of course compromises the seal of the cantrail to window glass. Perhaps what can add to the issue is play in the tension rod arrangement so that the cantrail can flop inward. Rigging up something to effectively push and keep the pin into the casting is a clever idea. I can't quite see how you have it attached. Is the stainless screw replacing the mounting screw for the casting screwed to the windscreen?

Thanks

Rick

 

[Gordon Holsinger]

Interesting issues and I have a comment and a question:
1. Bill, my passenger side rail seems to be more difficult to fit than the driver side. This may be due to a bent part or because the new top we installed is tighter on the passenger side; everything related to the soft top seems to work better when the sun has heated it a while. That being said, when I drove the car through a torrential rainstorm in May the only complaint was a few drops of moisture that came in over the top of the rear of the passenger window; again, possibly related to the fit of the new soft top. Interestingly, possibly due to the new boot seal from SS, the boot was dry.

2. Gary T - you said the nylon U shaped tension rod holder is available. When I tried to replace a broken one in June, SS did not have any; where do you recommend that I can find one?

Sunbeam alpine

 

[Gordon Holsinger]

Sunbeam alpine

sunbeamalpinetigersparescouk has the nylon u shaped cantrail parts part # 0160g at 11.40 pounds for a pair

 

[Bill Blue]

Rick, I can't give you a definitive answer. I no longer have the car and I cannot remember exactly what I did, but it looks like I replaced the mounting screw with a long screw that had three nuts and a wingnut screwed on it. The outermost screw was tightened onto the casting, two were jammed together to serve as a stop while the wingnut hold the guitar pick shaped position. I say this because while my memory is very foggy, I do not remember drilling and tapping for screws. Hopefully, Dan will correct me as he now has the car.

Bill

 

[todd reid]

An alternate, and possibly simpler solution, is to drill a small hole in the pin and use an "R" clip to retain it. I saw this done years ago by an owner who liked to drive with the convertible top rolled back to the cross bow for a t-top effect.

 

[Bill Blue]

An alternate, and possibly simpler solution, is to drill a small hole in the pin and use an "R" clip to retain it. I saw this done years ago by an owner who liked to drive with the convertible top rolled back to the cross bow for a t-top effect.

But introduces small fiddly parts which cannot be tightened to lock the "guitar pick" into proper position and are very easy to drop. A great positive of using the captured wing nut; you don't need to see it. We tighten the cantrail retainers before spreading the top material and still outside the car. A two hand operation, which takes only a second or two and done by feel while standing on the tarmac.

Bill