Tell me this will fit ...

Yes, very wrong. Tim, are they both like that ? Check your upper hinges as per proper location. Is the door rod all the way down in the hole at the bottom of the opening ? Good luck.

 

Well mine is not quite as loose by the windshield as your photo shows. Snapping will tighten up the lower part of the door on yours (which you already know). I have to lift up on my doors just a little to close them. They seem to hang a little low. But I also had to lift up on the doors on the Sears top I put on the 73. That's the only new tops I have had any experience with.

Yours also looks like it sits a little high. How does the other side look?

 

There's been a lot of interest in this thread, so lots of pictures today. Note that my garage thermometer was pushing 90F yesterday (a record for Oct 9 of 87F yesterday in Boston), and the Jeep was parked in full sun.

Here's what I did - I didn't want to cut up the factory bows, so I started by making some shorter 'extensions' and secured them with electrical conduit couplings. The bows are made from 3/4" EMT, so this worked fine. I also drilled a couple of holes in the front bow to shorten them.



Both bows are effectively shortened by 3/4" at the ends. With the sun, heat and shorter bows, I was able to pull the corners into place, and start down the body to secure the snaps. Also, a tip from my Jeep dealer days: rather than using chalk as suggested in the instructions, use a soft face hammer and whack the snaps when they are up against the body. This will leave a clear circular mark in the paint and show you where to drill.

Here's what the top looks like in place. The sides and back are taut, but the roof is a little wrinkly, similar to Mark's Jeep above. I have since been able to remove most of the obvious wrinkle on the right side.





I had to redrill one of the holes in the tailgate snaps to get the tailgate flap to snap all the way across. (I also had to drill a new hole for a snap in the rear bow, but drilling the tailgate bugs me more because I had to drill a hole in my Jeep. In both cases, the snaps were not placed in the fabric accurately.)

I still have some issues. The bow strap on both sides is way too short.



One of the suggestions that Bestop made was to run the eyebolts for the rods in as far as possible. This is as far in as they can go, and still have the rod be removable.



You can see that the snap does not reach the windshield on that side. I may have to fab a little extender with a snap. The right side is slightly better.

The left door is problematic, as you can see in the pictures above. The bottom edge does not stick down to meet the body. Comparing the right door to the left, you can see that the left door weld joint at the bottom is an inch higher than the right. I expect this is a QC issue and I will be contacting Bestop about it.



I'm not really happy with the fit of either door - but the right door is marginally acceptable. I'd think they could make a more accurate jig for the door shape than this.

 

TIM
THANK you for running the gauntlet for us
and explaining the outcome of your purchase.
i would be frustrated too.
but at least you wont get rained on.

 

Yes, thanks for the trouble shooting Tim. You seem to have a calm, cool reaction to this.

I think that if it were me I'd be turning various shades of red for having so much trouble on something that costs so much and is "made to fit".

I'm glad you have it on now.

 

Tim, glad you got it on. I too had a lot of problems with the doors . Given the chance , the next top will be a super top.

 

Holy crap !! After reading through this I do NOT look forward to installing this top on my 6. Just seems like a lot of hassle, but seemingly worth it in the end?

 

Well, the Super Top would have been an option, but it's not available for the CJ-6.

Worth it? You have few alternatives with a CJ-6. Either this top, or a used hard top, or a custom-made top.

If you can find an upholstery shop that will take it on, you might be able to turn a CJ-5 full top into a half-top for the CJ-6 (or for a CJ-5). It would be easier if you had a half-top to look at for an example...

If you could find a vintage full-top, you likely could have an upholstery shop make new fabric using the old fabric as a pattern. The shops that do this kind of stuff specialize in classic cars, and I expect the price would be in that range.

 

I sawed some of the rear of the horizontal rod which allowed the front bow to move forward. This allows the snap to go around the front bow. I started with 1/2 inch or so until I got the correct length cut off. It does not impact the fit of the door latch or top at all. It only moves the front bow forward and allows the snap to snap. I also adjusted the eye bolts to close the distance a little more.

I think it looks pretty good. I think we would like it to be wrinkle free but most people aren't looking at the top. They're looking at the wheels, lift, winch, tire carrier, and "wonder whut's under the hood?" Glad it is moving forward. I fully understood your pain.

 

Hey, check out the difference in the location of the rear corner windows. The bottom of your windows matches the bottom of the side windows and also the rear. Mine is lower. Less fabric from the bottom of the window to the tub. Hmmmm....What's up with that? Any other photos of a relatively new top like this?

This is the top I junked. It looks like those windows are higher like your top.

 

What or Who ..sold you this? It look like it was made by drunken Chinese .No support from the manufacturer . I am staying with my old beat up hard top.

 

After seeing what Tim went through, I'm thinking I'll get a custom top. I'd rather spend a grand towards that than to spend a grand and have to redo all the crap he went through..........

 

had issues with the top on my 5 as well new tiger top the doors don't fit well at all and the top or should i say both of the tops i got are baggy at the rear the first one had snaps in the wrong spot and of the wrong type the replacement top was marginally better qc was lacking on both...

 

glad you got it on Tim, sorry you had all the issues. I think I will stick with the super top once the one on my 5 goes in the bag, which will be another year or so.

 

Here's a link to what a tigertop on a 6 should look like. Boyink has a lot of good info on the site:
http://boyink.com/cj6/bestop-softtop/

 

I don't know if this will help but I bought a besttop for my cj,mine looked similar when I first put it on.I moved my bows to accomidate for the "lack" of length to get the back snapped down as the summer progressed and the heat worked on it I was able to move them back and it streched out!took all summer for the fit to be right but I didn't want to mess up a $700 top.

 

FWIW, that was my suggestion on the first page of this thread.