Since bringing Bumblestook back to road-legal status early last year I've been itching to drive her with the top off. Don't get me wrong, I love the Mugen hardtop. It's great for cold and hot days, track events and of course, it complements the looks really well but the S2000 is a roadster and on really nice days, nothing beats driving her with top off. The Mugen top itself isn't very heavy, it's only about 34lbs, but it's too big to safely remove and reinstall on the car by yourself. Now that I've moved to a garage with a higher ceiling, I finally got the opportunity to make this a reality by putting together a hardtop hoist so I can get the top off myself anytime I want.
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| Starting materials for the hoist - 8/25/2019 |
I picked up the smallest electric hoist I could find. It was a simple 220lb lift capacity hoist from Amazon (
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07FPN64Z9/). I used two pieces of 6ft 90-degree angled aluminum from Home Depot to make sure it was going to be rigid enough to support the weight of the hoist and the hardtop. Since the hoist is mounted via square brackets, this worked out nicely since I can slide the hoist left or right to center it on the car as needed.
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| Hoist mounted - 8/25/2019 |
To support the front half of the hardtop, I used 5ft of 3/4" copper pipe wrapped in 3/4" foam insulation. Through it, I threaded 1/8" x 30ft of vinyl coated steel wire rope and attached it to the hook on the hoist. I obviously didn't use all the 30ft so I cut it to size once I was content with the height of the bar. The only problem left was to figure out what I was going to use to hook the back of the hardtop. I couldn't find anything in local stores last week so I only finished the hoist this week after buying a set of Rightline Gear car clips (
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B007WR25KW). These are coated flat hooks that can hook over the rear of the hardtop without scratching it. I added some foam tape to further protect the hardtop from any marks.
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| Flat hook - 8/31/2019 |
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| Flat hook with foam tape - 8/31/2019 |
To attach the hook to the rest of the rig, I got a set of 16ft 1-inch tie-down straps (
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07FM4WGW2). The ones I got had an extra flap to prevent the buckle from contacting the hardtop.
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| 1" wide tie down straps - 8/31/2019 |
Finally, to connect the strap to the hoist hook, I used a pair of aluminum carabiners (
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07KTXLKWL) so it can easily be detached when I'm not using the hoist.
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| Carabiner to hold the tie down strap - 8/31/2019 |
Now the moment of truth, with everything hooked up, I pressed the button to raise the top and it did so very easily. I held the top with my other hand to help guide to make sure it didn't swing or spin around but for the most part it actually didn't move much laterally and I had plenty of room, fully raised, to clear the Mugen wing in the rear.
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| Top off - 8/31/2019 |
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| Top off - 8/31/2019 |
I forgot how awesome it is to drive her through some mountain roads with the top off. You really get to use all your senses. The incredible sound of the engine and exhaust as it screams through all the revs, the feeling of the chassis as you bomb through the corners, the joy of looking up and seeing nothing but sky and getting blasted by the smell of fresh cool air. This is truly the essence of the S2000, what Shigeru Uehara called the "Open Sports Car Concept", and it is what really makes this car so special to drive each time. VTEC + Open Top + Open Road = grinning from ear to ear for miles on end.
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Finally, Top Off...it's been a long time coming!
Seven Lakes - Bear Mountain - 8/31/2019 |
