Restoration of 2358R

[1970EuropaGuy]

Looking so sweet! Every time you update your post I look at my Lotus and think about how much work I still have to do.

I'm glad you had the beer after undercoating the wheel wells. Time to celebrate.

[Certified Lotus]

Thanks 1970EuropaGuy.  Your car looks pretty nice, not sure what you need to do to it.

Small step today.  Cleaned the rear window of residue and sealer then placed the new rubber gasket around the window with the etched name of the window manufacturer facing the right direction and the rubber seal with the locking strip on the outside. Now that I know how it fits I will remove the rubber seal and install on the fiberglass opening and trim it to prepare for trying to install the glass.

I just need someone to help me put it in. Someone who has a lot of patience as I understand its a bear to install.

 

[Stuleslie]

Strongly recommend you protect the paint work with card or something around the rear window, particularly at the curved ends. Whatever tools you use they will slip and take chunks out of the paintwork - believe me! 
Good luck
Stuart

[4129R]

I use a flat bladed screwdriver, a putty knife and soap hand cleaner to lubricate the rubber.

Getting the sealing strip in, you need a special tool which flares the opening and lets the strip in. That requires twice the patience on the straight bits, and 10 times the patience on the corners.

Make sure the glass is exactly central to the opening, or 1 corner will go in easily, and the opposite corner won't fit. Put tape at the centre on the glass, offer the glass up to the opening without the rubber fitted, make sure the gap at both ends is even, and put matching tape on the roof so you know when the glass is central when the rubber is fitted. 

[Certified Lotus]

Thanks Stuleslie and 4129R, great recommendations. The idea to mark the center of the window is an excellent idea and I’ll put painters tape near the edges to prevent any mishaps to the freshly painted body. A friend of mine has the tool to install locking strips so I maybe ok.

[Certified Lotus]

I had thought today would be a good day to install the rear window. Hot weather day, so the rubber molding will be nice and flexible. Got my plastic tools out for prying rubber moldings, found my go-pro camera suction cups for handling the glass easily, marked the center of the glass and the center of the opening as suggested by 4129R and put painters tape in various areas to prevent scratches and nicks while installing as suggested by Stuleslie. 

OK, placed the rubber molding outside for an hour in the hot sun to get it nice and flexible (on the rear trunk lid of one of my Elan's). Got the rear window opening all prepped. Installed the rubber molding and trimmed it to fit. Well, that was easy.

Got the glass in place, sprayed liberally with window cleaner (I have used this before for installing windshields, works great).  Started the prying of the glass into the molding and ........lets just say that after an hour of trying it became very obvious that this is a two person job. So......I put everything away and went on to a couple of other much simpler projects.

I needed to remove one of the welded bolts from each of the seat belt struts so I could attach the custom bracket I made for the rear deck lift.  Drilled out one of the bolt heads and then ground down the weld so it was flat to the surface of the metal plate.  Filed for finishing, cleaned off the area and then painted to match. Easy.

Then I prepped the throttle peddle for media blasting, got all the old paint off, prepped for painting with M600 and sprayed two coats of black paint.

Not bad for an afternoons work. Now who am I going to get to help me install the rear window ........

 

[BDA]

Now who am I going to get to help me install the rear window ........

You want somebody who's done it before but it might be hard to find someone who would go through that again! Good luck!

[dakazman]

 I was holding my breath just reading your story. Wish I lived closer to help. It’s always better to step back and safely rethink some jobs. Two sets s of hand in your case.
  Wow, your pedal assembly is completely different than my s2’s .
Dakazman

[EuropaTC]

Got the glass in place, sprayed liberally with window cleaner (I have used this before for installing windshields, works great).  Started the prying of the glass into the molding and ........lets just say that after an hour of trying it became very obvious that this is a two person job.

and

Now who am I going to get to help me install the rear window ........

I understand the pain, it took me far longer than it should have done to get my rear window back in.  But, as others on here have done, it is possible for a one-man operation even if it seems not to be.

A couple of things I did

1. I used nylon trim tools to spread the rubber and lever the glass into place. I used 2 or 3, a bit like you use tyre levers to change the inner tube on a bike wheel, so I'd have one "holding" whilst the next one was doing the levering.

2. I had the interior out of the car so could work alternately from inside and outside. This was a big help at either end where I'd have one hand inside with the other pushing from outside.  Hard to describe, easier to do !
 
3. Finally, I didn't buy my rubber surround from a Lotus specialist so this might not apply to yours, but I found that the dimensions were fractionally too small. Probably less than 1mm, but it made it very hard to insert the filling strip and very easy for the whole assembly to slide out of place.  I ended up by increasing the channel depth by a fraction using an old file and after that it flew in. (well, perhaps not that easy but it was more like the job you'd expect it to be)

It might be worth comparing the measurements of your old seal with the new. You'd expect some difference but if the depth of the channels are significantly different then you might be working harder than you should be. I've attached a diagram, it's not the right dimensions but you'll get what I'm on about from it.  From memory I think my glass was 4.5 or 5mm, the body lip I guessed at 2.5 and I think I ended up with a 5/3 channel width combination. After a couple of days struggling I measured the web on the new & old seals and that's why I increased the depth to match.

Brian

[Certified Lotus]

Thanks Brian. I don’t think the dimensioning of the trim is wrong, I just know better to struggle with something that really requires two people. And I didn’t want to chance breaking the glass.

Dave, appreciate your offer to help If you were closer. I’ll get one of my good Lotus buddies to come over that lives local. 

[Certified Lotus]

My Garage Tour was published in Absolute Lotus Magazine.

[BDA]

Wow! Our own Certified is famous!!! 

[Certified Lotus]

I'm very lucky to have friends who are Lotus enthusiasts and always willing to lend a hand. My friend Ted offered to come over today to help me install the rear window of my Europa. He brought Tim as help and I also got one of my sons to assist. So......there are four of us trying to install this window. And guess what. After almost two hours no deal. We tried installing with the molding on the glass and the molding on the opening. I finally said to stop and wanted to think about this more as everyone was getting a little rammy and that is when stuff goes wrong.

I would love to know how the factory guys did the rear glass window install.  I mean exactly how they did it. Has anyone ever spoken with one of them?

When everyone left I set about more mundane tasks like installing the windshield wiper motor (after cleaning off all the old yellow overspray and polishing the chrome fittings), the VIN Plates, a couple of aluminum vent tubes, the heater box, and the bonnet lock receiver. 

The install of the windshield wiper motor had me wondering what was going on as the bracket for the motor did not line up with the holes in the fiberglass wall.  I checked all my photos and couldn't figure it out. Finally went back to my photos and super enlarged a few to see there was a black bracket that mounted to the wall that had the bracket of the motor mounted to it.  Just made a mental note.....take more photos.  You never have enough!

[BDA]

Congratulations on your progress but it's too bad about your rear window. I can't help with any tips. I seem to remember over thirty five years ago, me and another guy got mine in but that's all... Actually, I remember it looked impossible until it finally went in.

Good luck!

edit: I remembered something about putting in a rear window!

[Lou Drozdowski]

Glen,
 Your rear window install sounds very similar to my adventure some years back. I also had my brothers to help...Six hands were required. The string method did not work.

I left the locking strip off... gasket on the glass...one brother inside, with the four hands outside.
After many attempts, we decided to start over by cleaning the gasket to body channel (dry) no lube. This provided a better bite and lowered the chances of slipping. Start in the middle lower lip and work your way outwards...once you get a couple of inches in...do the same for the upper lip. Your helper inside must mirror your outside progress.  I used a plastic spreader similar to a tongue depressor, to push the edge of the gasket in.  Keep constant pressure on the section you get installed. The hard part of course were the outer rounded  bends.

I know how frustrating you feel... It took us close to two hours and lots of cuss words. Good luck.