Never had a single sign of leakage on any of my Alfa's ~ not a hint. Maybe SA installed them better than your folk.

To this day the UK can't build a Mini straight. They are appalling. Recently BMW SA sent a whole batch back to your shores as totally unacceptable in fit & finish.

 

Rubber bits change with time and, though I don't recall how old it was, my Rover had a lot of years on it. Apart from the roof and a little rust in the sills, it was an excellent car. I bought it for £300, serviced the twin SUs and replaced a tie rod joint, used it for a year, and sold it for £350. The man who bought it didn't discuss the price. To make conversation, I asked him what he did for work and he replied that he worked in a group that cut holes in metal. I wondered if it was going to be the getaway car for a bank job.

BMW Minis: what do you expect? The factory those bodies come out of used to be the Pressed Steel Company! BMW should have known better than keep that part of the business.

 

Well they knocked Land Rover into shape for a while. Only the floorspace was used at the old Pressed Steel plant. Every item in the place is new state of the art. The problem lies with a crap labour force. Time for some firings. Staff can be replaced & there are not that many in a new plant like that.

 

The labour force was always the problem at Pressed Steel. In technology, they were generally amongst the best, if not best in the world, right from the start of the business.

 

"Best in the world"??? ~ I don't think so. That sounds like the days of Empire.

 

Nothing empire about it, much was imported from the US. I think they were amongst the first with finite element analysis, but it didn't filter down to the production line. I think Rolls-Royce resorted to taking the panels and doing a lot of assembly themselves - even if R-R Motors were not super hot on body precision.

 

Hmmm !!! The best of the US came from their German Scientists.

 

e.g. the Australians were first to develop the concept of atomic absorption spectroscopy (AAS) ~ CSIRO scientist Alan Walsh ~ amongst many other things.

We won't list SA firsts to remain humble.

 

It's good to remain humble. I'm a British engineer. I've worked closely with engineers, mathematicians and scientists from most countries in the world. I honestly believe that much of British engineering (and STEM in general) is very good. However, our manufacturing engineering has generally been poor and, in the case of the Pressed Steel Company I'd say atrocious.

I have the greatest esteem for Heynes', Hassan, Sayer, and co at Jaguar. They demonstrated creative genius, but they had little idea about many of the project aspects of engineering design and subsequent manufacture. Their system was too much a bunch of artisans in a workshop. My experience of detail structural design is zilch. I've only done global performance, but I'd never have passed the design details that Pressed Steel delivered to Jaguar, never mind what they actually made afterwards. Jim Randle had a problem in bringing some discipline into Jaguar projects, but it still looked like chaos when Ford arrived.

As John Egan said, you have to learn from the grown ups. In manufacturing, for many years that meant the Americans. The Japanese learnt from them and did even better. Glyn, I know you admire German engineering. I've nothing against it, but I'd say their strength is incredible persistence in development to the point they can make a good product even out of a not very good concept. One might compare what Porsche did with the 911 compared with Jaguar and the E-type. They also have the great benefit of a financial system that is very sympathetic to manufacturing. I suspect the UK banks were one of the main reasons for William Lyons' famous parsimony.

I'll stop and get off my hobbyhorse as this is no help to anyone with a sun roof.

 

My 51 Bentley has a sun roof that is pretty much the same as the cars in post #19, although I don't know who was the installer.
More then likely the same company who made the bodies, as all of the standard steel bodies appear to have had sun rooves.

One of the car club meets had us drive to Whistler, it rained the entire weekend, the drive up the mountain in the dark was most treacherous.
The cars sunroof had a new whisker seal installed and there were no leaks _ there were two small puddles of water at about 1/2 inch in the gutters on each side.
No water made it into the drain pipes at all as there was so little water.

The red car looks like it may have had a Whisker seal, but it's totally worn away, I would think it would leak very badly.

 

The US would not have put a man on the moon without it (Wernher von Braun) and all the later developments at NASA. The Space Shuttle would not have flown without Austrian engineering. When I was restoring my Jaguar I was surprised at how good some of the engineering design was in a simple thing like the steering column much less the IRS. It is a pity, in general, execution failed them & the reputation of Jaguar cars.

Yes I admire German engineering enormously but I am an anglophile at heart and always will be. It is my direct & indirect heritage afterall ~ Surrey! My Dad was Canadian of British parents. My Mum was direct of British parentage.

I remind you that Robert Oppenheimer was a German Jew as was Albert Einstein!!!

My brother-in-law's late father had 3 Masters Degrees from London University ~ Marine, Mechanical & Aeronautical. Harry had enormous respect for fine German engineers & so do I. He was a bomber pilot in WW2. We are not talking about ***** here.

 

Refresh page due to edits.

 

Thanks to all those who have replied. Interesting discussion.

With regard to sunroof leakage and engineering.

In 1990 I purchase a car that I was looking for for many years at the time, 1 BMW CS (1970 2800) coupe with a sunroof, 4 speed (now 5) and AC.

It was a California "rust free" car. Yea right!! Actually it was fairly rust free, but in general those coupes were notorious for rusting due to their complex construction.

Well turn out the only major rust was at the front and back of the rocker panels. In BMW's infinite wisdom, the two front drainage tubes drained from the Golde sliding sunroof front down into the rocker panel. The rear two drains actually did drain out through the trunk floor. But there are C-pillar vents on each side and they drained into the rear sections of the rocker panels.

We have since during our current restoration relocated the drain tubes out into the wheel wells.

Anyhow we are still looking for a "rust free" MK2. Trying to find one with a sunroof at a decent price is proving fruitless, hence the idea for the Webasto kit.

I do have a question on the manual boxes with overdrive. I had two AH-3000's that had the similar OD unit. On the MK2 does the OD function only in 4th or 3rd as well as it did in the Healey?

Thanks
Jeff

 

Webasto Vinyl sliding roofs do not leak in general. Some very minor maintenance might be required from time to time like any other component of a car. They have a sound reputation for excellence. I have never suffered a single leak from a Webasto Vinyl Roof and SA can suffer monstrous thunder storms along with hail on occasions that will pierce an aircraft wing.

The OD only operates in 4th gear. You can rewire that at your own peril of OD and/or GB damage. We have Torque to consider. Cass' Dad did that in racing. But remember in racing you only have to finish the race. Long term durability is of no consequence.

 

Refresh the page for edits.

 

I'd not use an overdrive with the lower gear ratios of a Mk2. As Glyn said, without a lot of strengthening of the OD, the torque will eventually break it. Unless the engine is extremely modified with wild cams, there's no need, certainly not for road use, as the XK has a very broad torque curve. As I think Bob Jane (Australian racing driver and general entrepreneur) put it (not totally seriously) when asked how he coped with the potentially obstructive Jaguar gearbox, "I find the highest gear I need on the circuit, stick it in that and leave it there. The engine takes care of the rest." Those might not have been the exact words, but near enough.

 

To add to Peter's wise words. The OD's oil pump feeds the gearbox. One would not want OD wear debris entering the pressure feed to the GB and damaging it. My advice is don't even dream of doing it.

 

If I were modifying the overdrive control, I'd go the opposite way. Keep it available only in top. Add a couple of relays and make the switch momentary so that it would be impossible to accidentally change up from third direct to overdrive top.

 

And NEVER bypass the reverse gear inhibitor switch on top of the GB. If you engage reverse gear with the OD on/engaged the one way roller clutch in the OD will explode. OD kaput.

 

An S Type with a Webasto Sunroof