Barn Door for JK factory hardtops

[jscherb]

I appreciate the insight. My concern is the soft top fabric wear at the hard top interface due to wind buffeting. Did you put gommets in the fabric, sandwich the fabric in metal/plastic strips, etc? Hope this makes sense, and sorry for hounding you on this, but as you know I have a hardtop project of my own I am planning.

Thanks!

There are aluminum strips on the forward and top edges that sandwich the fabric in place. They are separate from the fabric parts so the fabric parts can be rolled up.

 

[TexasSpeedRacer]

Perfect! That is the information I was looking for; thanks again!

 

[jscherb]

Here are a few more cardstock design concepts for the JKU Safari Cab roof. They're intended to show general shape and proportion, they're not intended to be exact scale models.

To start with, for comparison purposes here's the cardstock model of the factory JKU model. Well, almost factory, this model does have a barn door on the back and opera windows on either side of the barn door, which are not features of the factory hardtop but are features the JKU Safari Cab will have.

The first one is very similar to the shape of my LJ Safari Cab design; it differs from the LJ version in that it has Alpine windows in the roof. The raised roof provides for additional headroom inside, plus storage above the roll bars. I've shown this one before.

The Safari 2 Concept uses the same molds as the Safari 1 above, but has two Alpine windows installed on each side.

The Vista is also a stepped roof design, except the rise is more angular and there are Vista windows in the front of the step.

I'm also working on a cardstock model of a step roof design, it'll look a little like this concept drawing I did for a step roof LJ Safari Cab some years ago:

The way the roof mold will be made and the parts will be molded in that mold there won't be any window cutouts on the raw part. So any of the concepts above that have Alpine or Vista windows could be assembled without any windows if that's what was desired. The windows are cut in after molding.

Comments welcome...

 

[jscherb]

Here's one more, I think this one is Tom's favorite...

 

[jscherb]

I said yesterday that the Safari 1 and Safari 3 rood concepts would come out of the mold the same and the windows would be cut in after molding, so here's 4 variations on that - no windows, 1 Alpine window per side, 2 Alpine windows per side, and with the Alpine windows plus a sunroof.

 

[emkay]

you are simply genious!!!!!


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

 

[jscherb]

The other day I posted this drawing of an LJ Safari Cab step roof concept and I said I was working on a JKU version in cardstock.

Here's the cardstock JK version:

 

[jscherb]

you are simply genious!!!!!

Thank you very much but I'm no genius. Just trying to design something cool and useful.

 

[emkay]

Believe me, i'd love to have those skills, i'm already lacking the ideas, not talking about fabrication where I am miles apart

allow me a question: why don't you make money out of that, I bet 99% that do this for business neither have your passion nor the skills...

p.s. I'd love to see your safari top combined with the possibility to flip it open like the j30


Sent via my bongo drums...

 

[jscherb]

Believe me, i'd love to have those skills, i'm already lacking the ideas, not talking about fabrication where I am miles apart

allow me a question: why don't you make money out of that, I bet 99% that do this for business neither have your passion nor the skills...

p.s. I'd love to see your safari top combined with the possibility to flip it open like the j30


Sent via my bongo drums...

If I went into business with my designs that would take all the fun out of it for me. I enjoy doing this as a hobby, working to my own designs and standards and not having to deal with customers, accounting, taxes, etc...

I have licensed some of my designs to companies to bringing the design to market though, that doesn't require me diverting too much of my attention from my own interests and hobby .

There's no reason my modular design couldn't be built as a tilt-up camper, I recently finished building a prototype trailer tilt-up and everything I did there is adaptable to a J30-style pop top, or perhaps a rooftop clamshell tent.

A "clamshell" concept using the same canvas parts and tilt-up cover:

 

[jscherb]

Here are a few more concept drawings - this time I've done wireframes over a JKU photo. The wireframes give an idea of the additional headroom inside the cab. I've also Alpine windows and a sunroof (a rear side sliding window too) to show where the windows would be in relationship to the seats. The first one is the Safari 0/1/2/3 concept:

And here's a wireframe of the stepped roof model I posted yesterday:

 

[POS]

I love "different" and I am about to drop an order for a 2015 Rubi 2-door. I came across this thread and then found GR8tops and their licensing of these. The LJ tops looks so damn cool and different that now I'm thinking of finding a low-mileage LJ just so I can get the hard safari top. But newer is better, so...

Any chance the JK ones will done by GR8tops?
Any chance the 4-dr versions can be remade into 2-dr versions?

 

[jscherb]

I love "different" and I am about to drop an order for a 2015 Rubi 2-door. I came across this thread and then found GR8tops and their licensing of these. The LJ tops looks so damn cool and different that now I'm thinking of finding a low-mileage LJ just so I can get the hard safari top. But newer is better, so...

Any chance the JK ones will done by GR8tops?
Any chance the 4-dr versions can be remade into 2-dr versions?

If these get to market, it would probably be a company other than Gr8Tops.

I will be building my molds so that both JKU and 2-dr JK versions could be made in the same molds, using removable forms in the molds - it's a technique I often use for making my prototype molds. An example: the mold below is 8' long, and makes side panels for my Jeep-tub trailer kit. There are forms in the mold in this photo for making two shorter side panels.

And here are two different length side panels made in that mold, but with different placement of the forms to make the different lengths:

I believe it will be possible, at least for making a prototype 2-dr JK Safari Cab, to put forms in the JKU Safari Cab roof mold in a similar way to mold a 2-dr length roof.

 

[POS]

I sure love the darn things. Scratches my itch for a modern 2-dr G-wagen feel with more natural light and headroom.

 

[jscherb]

... I'd love to see your safari top combined with the possibility to flip it open like the j30

OK

The same basic canvas design that I used on the tilt-up trailer camper I posted a few days ago could be used for this application.