Charles, I took this top down to individual parts. Primed with urethane, shot it one coat with silver and then two coats with black SG. The reason for the silver base is so I could intentionally miss areas with black like they did at Utica plant. I just didn't want to deal with surface rust in the future. All bushings were cleaned, fasteners and springs which should be phoshated were and chrome was either polished or rechromed. During reassembly all joints were lubricated with graphite so there would be no binding. After fooling with it again last night it I came to the conclusion that the new (and also the original) cylinders were good. The electrical voltage readings through the switch to the pump connection seemed good. That left the pump as the possible problem. Today I switched the resevouer from the detailed pump to another I had kicking around. Of the two spares this one sounded like it was spinning at higher rpm's then the one in the car. Refilled it and ran it through 5 up and down cycles of the cylinders (disconnected from the top). Right away my son said they seemed to be going up as quickly as they were going down. So it looked promising. We reconnected the top of the cylinders and crossed our fingers. First we pulled the top back until the header edge pointed vertically. We bumped it down a touch just to see if it would fold forward. No problem. We then took the header past vertical to say 1 o clock and stopped. Bumped it forward to see if it would go. This position had been a problem with the first pump. It pushed up without any drama. So we went for broke and set it in the fully folded position in the well. Took a deep breath and told jr to raise the top. Went up like a champ. IT LIVES.
Topped off the reservoir and now all I need to do is adjust the frame so it meets the door glass nicely. We took the car off jack stands and are planning to drive it up to greenbay to have the top installed between Tuesday and Friday. Then I go to visit Jim cross town and drop the motor in next Sat. So if everything goes as planned a week from now I will have a car which will still need some assembly but it will be drivable minus the front sheetmetal once I get the tranny detailed and installed.
