1957 hardtop leaking & adjustments

[knuckle47]

I’ve spent the last hour reading the 1957 shop manual on pages 9-24 and 9-25 with no clear pathway forward. If my windows are up and I close my doors , the top and rear edges of the window frame wind up on the outside of the flap of the soft top. If water were poured over this edge, it eventually would leak inside the car compared to that soft top overhanging the frame of the window and diverting the water over the window and down the side of the door.

I was hoping to find some form of adjustment to allow this to fit properly. Of course, if I lower the window and close the door…when I roll it back up, it will seat it self properly. Problem there is: if I’m locking the doors, I’m not in the car to roll up the windows. I have enough slack to use a small flat blade screwdriver and slide it up under the flap and re-position the top over the window, but not the ideal method.

Is there a trick to this adjustment? Am I overlooking something…. or is it a series of adjustment to shift the sides a 1/8” higher ?

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[1957Bird]

Don’t mean to be the bearer of bad news, but I don’t think there is a procedure or adjustment that’s going to correct the situation.
When I was inquiring about the same type of thing a number of years back a friend who has been messing around with baby birds for years said the best way to keep water from intruding around the windows was to keep the car in the garage🙂

 

[sshort67]

Installed a new top on the 57 this last summer with very similar results. Passenger side was better than the drivers side which sounds about like your situation. Looks good going down the road.

 

[knuckle47]

@1957Bird @sshort67 That is exactly my situation…even that the passenger side is better almost to the point that I can position that side with my finger. The section in the manual that might deal with this looks like it could make someone dizzy. . I’ll try cocking the top to squeak the left corner slightly forward and the right side back a touch… a mere 1/8” or less. I don’t know if the effort would be worth it.

As the funny duck I can be, it just eats at me that…if it worked properly in 1957, there is little reason for it not to be working now….just like the clock :0
The top is new as well and fits nicely, not wrinkled, like the army bed sheets: you could bounce a quarter off of it

 

[paul5456]

Do you have a factory top? I haven't encountered this problem with my original top, but when I had a Prestige top I ran into this situation

 

[knuckle47]

I would doubt it… it’s a factory frame but re-covered by a previous owner within the last year. Clean, tight and looks great other than this issue. I’d discovered today (without slamming my fingers in the door) that I can flair up the top edge with my fingers, close the door and release the flap into a normal position easily. It’s when the door is opened and then closed with the window up, it does this

 

[Ward 57]

I would doubt it… it’s a factory frame but re-covered by a previous owner within the last year. Clean, tight and looks great other than this issue. I’d discovered today (without slamming my fingers in the door) that I can flair up the top edge with my fingers, close the door and release the flap into a normal position easily. It’s when the door is opened and then closed with the window up, it does this

Could it just be a misfit weather stripping? Some are better than others.

 

[knuckle47]

I think it could be that…when it was installed, it could have been centered about 3/32 of an inch more to the right. That would have given it a touch more clearance on the driver side and not really affecting the passenger side flap since it has a bit more space. Very small differences but quite possibly enough to make it work right? Not really sure but this is my suspicion… this is my very first old collector car ( besides the cars I used for daily living, but those were newer modern vehicles)

 

[paul5456]

The top I have has no flap - the Prestige one did. Are the top irons mostly flat steel? The original main arms have a curve to them.

 

[knuckle47]

No, they are curved… but it may be a prestige top if they sell just the pre made fabric and you assemble it yourself. This has been powder-coated so it looks great and I may just have to leave it the way it is. Since I discovered I can ease the flap up with my fingers and not slam my hand…I can almost live with that