Hi, Mark -- and welcome,
You'll need better-informed responders than me when it gets into detailed analysis of the top (springs "missing"?: O dear) but I
can tell you that the later tops -- and I think all of them -- have a spring-loaded over-centering effect which is pretty strong and pulls the rear section up against the main body almost forcefully when they get within a foot or less of each other. This works well when the top is clear of its storage well, but to get it out of that well you have to reach below it all and be sure to raise it out as one package. Otherwise there is trouble: the main soft top mounts (at the door pillars) actually slide back an inch or so during some phases of soft top deployment (full up, for certain) and you'll get this result if you allow the rear section to remain in the well as the main part is raised; it jams that rear section back against the well wall and the boot latch at upper rear center blocks any chance it can be raised. I actually watched my PO damage his (mine now) nice newish top on that rough, nasty catch assembly in just that way; beware: it's not the time or place for main force!
If I understand your situation, your challenge now is to get the main top section back down in the well. If you can do that, the main top mount/hinge points will return forward, and then lifting the whole top assembly up and out as one should be no problem. However, I think maybe all three versions of our tops will resist returning from the position you're now in main section up and rear portion stuck in the well. Something in all that mechanism locks up. There are techniques for releasing it, posted here in times past and searchable (which can be a journey in itself). Others know it far better than I and will likely chime in here. Basically, if you can get it back down you're golden. And maybe the missing springs will make it easier to do that in your case.
Later there will be that matter of the missing springs and whatever else. Considerable complexity here. There are experts in this area and you may yet need one. Last/best resort for soft top parts, knowledgeable advice and expert repairs is member and vendor Gernold Nisius, proprietor of SL Tech (listed on this site among our vendors) on the northeast coast. But the raising and lowering are easy when you know how -- just keep it together
going both up & down -- and so apparently is the release of the main top's refusal to go back down once it's been raised without the rest of it. I know of no latching mechanism such as you've asked about; in mine and the few others I've had hands on it's handled by the springs. One may feel the need to 'nurse' the bundle in its travels up and down, but there is at least a tendency for the two sections to remain together; it can be quite strong but, at least on my car, it seems to be at its weakest when the top is down in the well -- just when/where you need it most. Originally, there was a ~ 2-3" square sticker in the well on the driver's side with illustrated instructions for raising and lowering the soft top.
Better luck,
Denny
