Gentlemen,
I've been watching this thread from the sidelines for some time now, and thought I'd share a few thoughts.
First, this is the ideal time to consider a hardtop fabrication, but the worst time to publicly try to get many people on board, as many cars are stored for the winter, and many roadster owners are away from this forum for the winter as well.
I implore those who have interest in this idea to continue, don't give up, but be prepared for pushing forward again come spring when cars start to come out of the garage again.
And that brings up another issue, those who live in areas where we must store our cars for the winter, are going to have no need for a hard top, and therefore no interest in one. But it does factor in as a selling feature for the next owner.
And the final point is based on my own experience with convertibles with a hard top option. I sold my 1955 Thunderbird this last September, which I had owned for 17 years, which had both the soft top and hard top. I also have worked in a restoration shop and helped restore and maintain Mercedes 450SL's and the year 2000 series of Thunderbirds, which had the two tops.
Without exception, the hard tops were used once or twice during the total ownership of the cars, and were a pain to install and remove, taking two persons to accomplish, and then were either suspended on a lift mechanism to the ceiling of a garage, or stored on an upright rack up against a wall in the garage. A great deal of money tied up in an accessory that was never truly utilized.
My point being, if you know you will use the hard top for driving in winter weather (say Portland, Oregon, and places where winter is more rain than snow and ice) or because you fear a fatal soft top failure), think wisely and consider how you would really use it.
My apologies to those trying to get this option fabricated, I'm sure you didn't need this downside pointed out, but having been there myself, with a car with a hard top I never used, I felt it should be voiced.
Gene
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