Spyder hood mechanism

[duncan23]

I went to see a Spyder on Saturday, and neither I nor the seller could work out quite how the hood is supposed to work (he has only had it a couple of months, and the previous owner died). It might be just a matter of technique for attaching it, or it might be parts missing.

Could anyone with a Spyder post some pictures of their hood, or a description of how it works? The hard top is logical for someone who used to have an X1/9, but the hood has me stumped.

Any help would be gratefully appreciated - it's the only issue that has me concerned.

[SubGothius]

Depends on what you mean, i.e. whether you're speaking British or American:

If by "hood" you mean something equivalent to "bonnet", it hinges at the front of the car, so pulling the catch under the dash (there should be redundant levers, one on each side ;) ) should pop it open at the cowl, just in front of the windshield.

If by "hood" you mean something equivalent to "ragtop" or "targa", they each have latches. The rear ragtop is fairly straightforward; just pull the rearward end of each latch (each one may have a leather fob attached to grab) downward until it releases, then unhook them and flip the top back -- ye can even re-raise it one-handed from the driver's seat if ye attach a lanyard to the frame (a 1"-wide strip of nylon webbing clamped down between one of the latch bases and the top bow works well ;) ). The targa panel is indeed just like an X1/9's and has two similar latches at the front end -- just pull downward to release, then unhook -- and two slightly odder latches at the rear end -- these also pull downward to release, but they don't hook/fit into/onto anything; when latched, they just press up against small plates on the interior side of the rollbar, effectively clamping the rollbar's leading edge between the rear edge of the targa panel and the latch "feet".

Re-reading this back to myself, it comes off about as clear as mud, but sounds like ye have the targa bit down already, so rest assured the ragtop is no more complicated, and prolly less so, than it may seem. :)

[duncan23]

I'm talking UK - the bit I'm stuck on is the ragtop.
It's down now, and there were a couple of problems when putting it up:
1) it didn't seem to want to attach to the car at the back edge. This could just be that it needs a "bead" around the bottom I guess.
2) the pivot point had no bolts in it, so you couldn't quite see what the bars that pivot off it were doing.
3) I don't think there were 2 pivoting bars as there seems to be in a picture I've seen.

I agree with you about the back targa catches being odd. They seem to work though.

[SubGothius]

Ah yes, well, a partially-disassembled ragtop frame missing some pivot bolts, I can see how one would have questions about that. :lol:

If the lower/rear edge of the top is detached at all, then it's missing at least the screws that hold the lower bow to the body, perhaps missing that (non-articulating) bow entirely -- at least I think it's like a bow, or at least some means to attach the lower edge of the ragtop semi-permanently to the body.

Two major pivots, one at each side, articulate the main bow, which meets up against the rear edge of the rollbar. That main bow has a small secondary bow that pivots back from it midway up the sides, to keep the ragtop properly "tented" when up. Two straps of fabric webbing, each running along either side of the rear window, run from the main bow to the secondary bow to the lower bow; these straps are permanently attached to each of the three bows such that when the top is raised, the straps are drawn taut to locate the secondary bow properly. In practice, when fully assembled properly, all you have to do is raise or lower the top by pivoting the main bow up or down, and the rest of the articulation takes care of itself; it's really quite simple and elegant, if I do say so myself.

This crude ASCII diagram (side view) may give you some visual reference to accompany the above description; the top and right lines represent a strap, the left line is the main bow, the lower line is the lower bow or mounting plate, and of course the diagonal in the middle is the secondary bow:

______
\ / \
\ / \
\o \
\ \
\O_____\

[duncan23]

Thank you.
That makes sense. When I next go see it I'll know what I'm looking for. The hood is intact, the engine runs and the bodywork is pretty sound, so I'm seriously cosidering buying it as a (farily easy) project. It's going for an MOT this week, so we'll see what it fails on...