Fitting "David's" Style Bars - By Sean Lacey

[markiii]

1 – Pull the seats all the way forward and pull the seat release lever to move the seat backs forward. Now lower the locker doors so that they lay flat on the transmission tunnel - place a blanket at the bottom of the luggage bins to catch any dropped bolts and little parts, if you think you may lose bits!



2 – Raise the rear edge of the 2 door sills.



- Remove the plastic pins clips (push the centre pin in, then remove the whole clip) from the 2 rear side plastic parts from where the seat belts protrude; don't remove the belts from the sides, only pull them of 20 centimeters and block them. Now pull the side trim away from the car, this may take a little force!

- Take off the two white plastic clips on the side of the trim, if they don't keep in place on the sides (if they remain on the car), be sure to remove them (use long nose pliers on the shaft, NOT the round back.




3 – Remove the wind deflector by taking out the black plastic part below the hinges to expose the bolts, and then take the four nuts off to allow you to remove the deflector, then remove the 'pull' handle that releases the soft top – remove the plastic cover then remove the two screws inside.





- Now remove any remaining clips on the plastic trim that runs along the top edge, and then remove the trim itself.

DURING THIS OPERATION, NOTE THE EXACT PLACE OF THE DIFFERENT CLIPS YOU REMOVE, there are a number of different types!


4 – Put the new fixings for the wind deflector on the bar before installing it; use a short screwdriver (4 screws + washers M4 X  s8) s8)  – also paint black or use a Marker pen to color the white plastic part which is used to help hold the new plastic trim, then install this using the middle hole on the bar.



5 – Remove the four M8 screws on the car (see pictures, socket shows which bolts to remove) then place the bars on top of the existing transversal support. Replace the removed bolts with the two M8 x 60 (long bolts, vertical hole) and two M8 x 30 (shorter bolts, horizontal hole – use the round spacers also if you DO NOT have hardtop fixings), using the small size washers on all four bolts.

- Screw down the long bolts, but do not tighten them completely – now screw down the horizontal bolts, while pulling forward (towards the front of the car) on the bars – tighten the horizontal bolts completely, then the vertical.

- Next, install the two M8 x 40 bolts horizontally through the bar – for this you will need the two steel rectangles with the hole drilled through, these will act as nuts. Feed the piece up through the channel behind the hole on the bars (this is fiddly!), then put the bolt through and screw tight.






 
6 – Now stick the rubber profiling, attach the rear bar trim cutout to the profiling too, but don't stick the two ends down now (the last little section after the bar cutout); wait until the end of the install to do it.

- Place the new plastic trim around the two hoops, and replace the clips that you removed from the original trim.

- Replace the 'pull' handle of the soft top.

- Screw the two small screws on the (previously white) black plastic part to adjust the level of the new trim; don't screw them all the way in. As you can see from the picture, there is an unsightly gap in the trim, although this isn't very noticeable once everything is back together, I am looking into a solution to cover this, update to follow.



7 – Replace the side trim (with the seat belts), don't forget to replace the white clips onto the trim if you haven't already; to place them, (if you have hard top fixings only) you have to bend their top at the level of the hoops; you will now need to cut off the protruding tabs so that the trim will sit flush on top of the bar (see picture, tab is above the black section that hangs over the bar support). Also take care to replace the two fasteners into each side at their exact place on the frame (where there is no paint).



- Push down the door sills.

- Stick the end of the rubber profiling on and stick the plastic semi-circles on the hoops to support the rear bar trim cutout.

- Replace the wind deflector (if you want) and stick on the two badges, or something of your choice to hide the deflector fixings.

 

8 – Stand back and admire your new bars!



Hopefully there won't have been any problems during the install, you may find that the new plastic trim needs some minor adjustment, feel free to have a go, but if in doubt or you have any other problems or questions, leave a post on the Style Bar Install thread or PM myself (Slacey), Roger (Roger H) or David (David 0153) direct.

© Sean Lacey, 2003