I notice it coming into my driveway, where I roll across the curb/gutter into the driveway at an angle. Without the HT, the car flexes and one of the rear tire diverters (the flaps) scrapes. With the HT, there is almost no flex and the flaps don't scrape. Quite a difference. Like I said, I was surprised myself.

 

The hard top is not structural. It add no rigidity. The CR is stiffer because there's a crossbrace where the soft top, motors, and spare tire would be.

 

[QUOTE=takeshi,Aug 3 2008, 12:56 AM] The hard top is not structural.

 

Anything that attaches (firmly) to the car in more than one place is going to add some rigidity, but like I said, the amount is neglidgable.

 

The difference may be small, but it's definitely there.

 

I haven't noticed any increase in chassis rigidity when adding the hardtop. I already have a Rick's X-brace....maybe it's slightly noticeable without any other aftermarket bracing? Either way, it's held on by a few clamps.....far from ideal in terms of bracing.

The hardtop looks fantastic on this car, I love mine. Much quieter inside as well.

 

thanks for the input.

 

Are you suggesting that the entire car was flexing enough prior to adding the hard top, that it essentially conformed to a relatively extreme contour (as evidenced by your saying the tire never left the ground). But now, with the hard top in place, it stays much more rigid...to the point of fully unloading the suspension on one corner and picking up a tire???? I don't doubt your experience, but rather the conclusion you reached as to why this occurred.

I'm having trouble seeing how, at driveway speeds, your S2000 had enough body flex one day to play gumby and keep tires planted, and then suddenly with the addition of a hard top turned itself into a rigid board. The S2000 is very rigid to begin with, a hard top is not going to make the kind of difference that lifts a damned tire going into a driveway.

I'd guess you either currently have, or previously had a suspension problem, or even more likely you took a different line into the driveway that allowed the suspension to fully droop and lift a tire.

 

BUT, you are still ADDING weight in the worst possible place as far as COG (center of gravity) goes, up high.

FWIW, I love my Hardtop.

 

Well, I can't say for certain, but that's what I noticed. I drive up/down that driveway almost every single day and after I got the hardtop, it started lifting the tire. It's been several thousand miles, and the hardtop is creaking a lot now and it doesn't do it anymore.

I can't really say if it was the hardtop that did it, but I couldn't really give you a reason other than that it didn't do it before the hardtop, and now it does. Weird. I agree with everyone that the difference is negligible, but I also agree with the one guy that said no matter what it is, when you bolt something rigid between two points on the body, you WILL be increasing the rigidity slgihtly, however noticible or not.