Metal Electric sunroof in a 260Z 2+2

[RBZ 260]

Finaly got some time to post about this since few ppl asked to do so.

 

As most of you will know the car came with a crapy pop glass sunroof which i hated.

 

At the time finding replacemnt roof was difficult and wasnt looking forward in replacing it anyway.

 

One morning woke up and idea came to me to use a sunroof metal type one from another car and fit it into the 260z.

 

In Adelaide we have these self serv wreckers with lot of old cars. lucky for me that day there was a 260 2+2 and handfull of old cars with metal sunroof.

 

the one that cought my eye was the 1984 toyota celica. roofline was similar as well as the size. few quick measurments seemed to be good fit.

 

quick grinder chop and $60 after i was on my way home to start installing.

 

the new sunroof cut out was bit larger which was good in a way. ive unspoted the reinforcement from the celica roof cut around 3cm from the edge of the celica sunroof squared it up on the 260z roof and marked it out.

 

After that a jigsaw did the hole enlargemnt. once the hole was made the small part of the original celica roof (just 3cm around the sunroof hole) was placed in and spot welded in few spots. every 5cm or so to stop heating the metal and causing it to buckle.

 

next step welding the rest of the sunroof lip was time consuming. as i could only weld not more than 2cm at the time and than shifted on oposite side to give time to cool down to stop buckling.it worked but took a while.

 

 

After that was a matter of installing the subframe with the motor and slides few mods just to help it go with the curves of the 260z roof line 3 holes on each side for rivet thread to be installed on the A frame.this is to bolt the original celica brackets to side of the frame for reinforcment.

 

 

the rest is bit of alignment and smoothing out the edge with tiny bit of body filler.

[RBZ 260]

more pics

[zedevan]

i remember a link to this awhile back, bloody awesome job, after driving round in x's car i semi like the idea of a sunroof, and what a great mod to do to a car with an existing hole

[Toecutter]

Very nice job. Looks factory. There's quite a few Z's going round with dodgy leaking sunroofs from the early 80's. Here's an excellent solution to that problem. Do you think it would have fit in a 2 seater?

[RBZ 260]

Yeah not the 84 celica it will be too big for 2 seater. But maybe 1986 or even 1990s one.

 

the 1990s one have very small roof and failry simila curves. and from memory they are metal as well.

 

Also the 1990s one has two modes. the small lift up or complete slide inside.

 

on my white 240z i got sunroof too pop one, though its in good condition and doesnt leak and looks good from the inside. :evil: im eather going to weld it up (if the car is to be retained as close to stock retro) and if not i may do the same trick to it as i did on the 260z.

 

im seriously thinking making the 240z a crazy animal with most probably with gtr runing gear including the 4wd setup. have to give other gtrs, wrx,evos and turbo porsches run for their money. :twisted: next project when i move in my new home. got tons to do for next 2 years. before even looking at the 240z.