SA cargo cover

[t_g_farrell]

First I cleaned the cover with warm soapy water on the bottom side and covered it
with Goop hand cleaner on the top side. I used a soft bristle brush and some
water to scrub and rinse both sides. Then let it dry for a week or so in my garage
while I collected what I needed to do the rest.

I decided I would replace all the snaps and got 2 of these snap kits at Lowes
that are meant for repairing boat covers and such. It contains tools to install the
female part of the snap in the canvas and a male snap piece with a sheet metal
screw to allow for easy installation. These are almost identical as the old ones
I removed from my car when I realized I had lost the cover.



I also got some stainless steel S hooks of the right size to replace the 3 hooks
at the rear and I bought 2 cans of Duplicolor flat black vinyl paint to use on the
bottom side. To fix the crumbled plastic reinforcement in the cover I picked up
a sheet of plastic ceiling tile at Lowes.

Heres the bottom side painted with the flat black. Makes a world of difference and
will look nice when the hatch is opened. I had replaced the snaps at this poing as well.



Doing the snaps



Slit open the wings and dumped out what was left of the reinforcing plastic.





I cut out the plastic sheet to fit the wings and inserted it into the wings using the
slit I cut to empty it. I then slipped some duct tape upsidedown under slit to
keep it closed. A more permanent solution will be to use some iron-on patches from
a sewing store but I wasn't thrilled with the way the platsic worked out and will
be replacing it with some thick vinyl sheet which won't crack or crumble when
bent.

[t_g_farrell]

Heres the plastic being cut for the wings



Inserting the plastic in the wings



And sealing up the slits



Next I took a look at the rear hatch attachment hooks and elastic bands.
Each wing has an imbedded aluminium tube that had a long elastic cord that ran
the length of the tube imbedded in the wing. These were fastened by being sewn
into the back edgd of the wing as part of the assembly. Mr. Murphy struck and
made these old elastic cords break loose. So I pulled the tubes out and cut the
cords to a short length of good cord. I then crimped a loop on one end and
inserted it into the tube and achored it with a screw run through the width of the
tube. I then reinserted the tubes into the wings and replaced the 3 hooks with
new stainless steel (this is the center hook):



Ok, cleaned both sides and painted bottom of cover, replaced snaps, restored
wing reinforcment, restored attaching cords and hooks. All thats left is
installation.

[t_g_farrell]

This cover and my old cover differed slightly in the number of mount snaps
on the bar and on the lower valance that drapped over the front of the bar.
Original cover had 2 snaps on the bar and only 3 on the lower valance. This
cover has 3 on the bar and 7 on the lower valance. The rear snaps were the
same (one on the end of each wing) but didn't line up exactly where the old
holes were.

So I got my drilled and proceeded to install all 12 snaps in the car. While doing
this there was a lot of installing/deinstalling the cover to make sure I had good
snap placement and tension once it was all installed.

Theres a bit of glass glare but this is the installed cover



Heres a picture from the inside driver side door



And when its opened



I know the picture are kind of poor but I'll get some better ones later with a real
camera instead of my cell phone.

Of course its not complete. I want to redo the wings and rear reinforcement and
I want to hit it with some pledge polish to make the vinyl shine like new.

Most of all I want to thank Mike for contacting me and making this possible.

My SA is whole again.