Went to close the top on my '06 4S Cab this afternoon and the closing sequence for the top had a problem. When the back cowling tried to lift up to allow the top to lift out of storage, the cowling stuck in the closed position on the RHS. The left side was opening which caused the cowling to groan and flex so I promptly stopped, shut the car off and left it with the top in the down position.
Has anyone had this happen to them? Any ideas?
Thanks

 

This just happened to me two weeks ago on my 997.2, which has the same mechanism. There are three cables that operate the clam shell, one for the rear latch and two that both operate the front latches and also move the lid. The cable on the passenger side had snapped. Unfortunately, you cannot buy just the cable, you can only buy the whole assembly. There is a used one on eBay, but I decided to pony up and buy a new one. The PET number is 997-561-021-00. Here's a pic of my broken one after I took it out.



Replacing it is a pain, but straightforward. Follow the procedure in your owners manual for manually opening the clamshell until the driver side starts to lift. Then carefully attempt to lift the clam shell open by hand. You may need someone to turn the opening tool counterclockwise slowly while you lift. If the passenger side will not budge, then you were unlucky and the cable snapped before it disengaged the front latch.

This is the front latch in the open position.



If the side flap is open, use a long hook to grab the bottom of the latch here and pull toward the front of the car to disengage. It should take very little force. If it doesn't move easily, your cable may not be snapped after all, so use care.



If the side flap is not open, the procedure to open it with the tool is in the manual, along with how to open the hydraulic valve so you can manually close your top, which you will need to do to access the drive assembly that moves the clam shell. After you close the top, close the hydraulic valve.

Once you have the clam shell open and the top closed, pop the two tensioner cables off with a screw driver and lift the back of the top up and out of the way. There is a formed liner that covers all of the mechanicals, you need to pull it out.

Then you will be able to see the drive assembly, which by the way is a pretty cool bit of engineering if you take it apart for fun. To test if the cable is broken, unscrew the part that connects the actuator to the lid hinge.



Then see if you can move the actuator back and forth easily. If you can move it through it's range, the cable is snapped.

After replacing the drive assembly and putting it all back together, you have to turn the manual screw that you turned to open the lid clockwise a few turns while preventing the lid from moving, so that it unscrews a bit to re-engage the shaft with the motor. When you turn it counterclockwise to open the lid, it actually tightens and pulls the shaft out of the motor so you can turn it by hand. That little nugget of knowledge took me quite a bit to figure out!

Now here's the fun part. You need a Durametric or PIWIS tool to calibrate everything before you can use the interior switches to open or close the top. First use the Durametric to close the clam shell (called compartment lid in the software). Fully closed is the only microswitch-controlled position of the lid. The rest of the travel is metered by the potentiometer that is connected to the motor shaft, which is likely way out of whack after the replacement.

Once the lid is closed, you can then use the Calibrate Top feature in the software. It will either fully close or reopen your top. Then do it again a few more times. It will make a few groaning sounds at the limits, this is normal. Congrats, you're done.

There is a good write up of opening everything up here http://www.pelicanparts.com/techarti..._Mechanism.htm

This is what mine looked like mid-project




Steve

 

Nice write up. Good instructions are a thing of beauty.

 

Wow. Thanks for the write up PrimeMvr!
Very much appreciated. I'll post again once I do some poking around.

 

So I finally got the cab top fixed. As PrimeMvr mentioned in his detailed post (many thanks btw), it was indeed the clamshell actuator mechanism (~ $600 from Pelican) that he indicated.
I got unlucky and the cable snapped before it disengaged the passenger-side front latch on the clamshell. Considering that the whole DIY revolved around being able to manually open the clamshell to gain access to the actuator, things were looking grim.
Despite several attempts to activate the latch (with long screwdriver, coat hanger, etc...) I gave up and booked a visit to the stealership. After several failed attempts to free the latch, the mechanics had to remove the cotter pin to slide the stainless steel arm off the latch - apparently when the cable snapped, it jammed the arm.
Anyhow, $1,400 (Cdn) or $1,000 USD later and it's fixed and I can happily drive my car without first consulting with a meteorologist.

 

This is a fantastic write up, and I’ve learned most of this, but not all of this over the past year. Thanks for the additional knowledge. I’ve actually been through three motors, and I swear I have an exorbitant amount of money invested in chasing this problem. Every time I replace this it works for a while, and then ultimately pulls the cable out of the drive unit always on the passenger side. I have it now at the third shop but they seem to really know what they’re doing. I think it’s all in the adjustment but my theory is it keeps running after the latch on the passenger side is shut and thus is putting too much stress on the cable.

I don’t know if it needs to be re-calibrated again after it kind of breaks in and the cables stretch or what my problem is, but it’s really making me not enjoy the car.

I do see that there is a micro switch on the second cable that operates the rear center latch and I guess that’s what since the signal that the top is closed. I so just one question there is no microswitch switch for the side latches that’s just counting revolutions of turning in the motor, correct? The only thing I can figure is the computer sort of loses count overtime and thinks it needs to have one more revolution which pulls the cable out a little more and it keeps furthering getting out of whack.

The only thing I’ve noticed is that the mount that mounts that drive unit and the motor is fairly flimsy if you compare it to a 996 it’s a much bigger bracket

Any clues on why this would happen only on the passenger side that’s the only time that it errors out and that side doesn’t close all the way or pulls out and eventually breaks everything else in the mechanism has been replaced, including the Rams





The pictures above are from my current situation. It is interesting. I took the other part that was broken apart and really it’s just a set of vertical teeth attached to a cable it would be really nice if you could just replace the cable instead of this hole part that’s listed for $2500.

I have another thread on this it was going to go back and add some pictures but you’ve done such a great job. I don’t think it’s necessary. Thanks for the help.

One additional question: when you’re in this calibration mode in the system software, how on earth does it know where the side locking mechanisms are to calibrate it correctly? If there’s no micro switch at the end of the side clamps and it’s just counting revolutions, how do you know you can’t book calibrated it to the correct revolutions if you don’t know where the latches are?

 

Hi powderzone. Quick question. How many hours should a mechanic charge to remove and replace a defective convertible top drive part # 997-561-021-01 Thank you. Randy

 

Any one has an old cable i can buy off then instead of buying a whole new drive mechanism ?? Pls help txt or call me 6147028918

 

I had the same thing happen. I sent the broken cable to a place in Saskatchewan, Manitoba Canada. They repaired it with a new internal cable shipped back for about $130 bucks CAN ;-)

https://airtechproducts.ca/products/product/custom-cables-manufactured I have no affiliation with them... They just are super helpful and saved me a bunch of money and the turn around was less than a week.

Hope this helps others.

:-)

 

[QUOTE=chonniedotcom;19606818]I had the same thing happen. I sent the broken cable to a place in Saskatchewan, Manitoba Canada. They repaired it with a new internal cable shipped back for about $130 bucks CAN ;-)

https://airtechproducts.ca/products/product/custom-cables-manufactured I have no affiliation with them... They just are super helpful and saved me a bunch of money and the turn around was less than a week.

Hope this helps others.

Daaaaaamnnnn it's a gem

 

when you shipped did you send just the cable or the entire drive unit? Had the same catastrophic event happen to my 997.2 this week. Thank you

 

I sent them the whole cable and they sent it back all fixed. ;-)