R107 Hardtop removal

[pj]

Hello Everyone,
one of my best friends here in London, Canada, bought a 1975 450SL a couple years ago. He knows the crank-thing that pulls the hardtop down wasn't working right, but was able to use it last summer. Now he's brought the car out of storage (and Dan C's done a few nice things to the engine) but by golly the hardtop won't come off. We tried rotating it back and forth, but that didn't help. Before he takes a hacksaw to the thing, does anyone have any suggestions?

[Benz Dr.]

I never touched that thing! Honest, I didn't......

[hkollan]

Hi,

I had the same struggle with my 1985 500 SL where it turned out the hardtop was stuck, and I could not retract the
latch in the rear center. It took me half a day to get it off, here is what eventually worked in my case.

If you can lift/pry the hardtop slightly up in the back, try to gently force a wisegrip or similar tool
under the HT to lock around the pin and turn it counterclockwise enough to go free of the latch/hook on the car.
With a few helping hands lifting in the front and turning the hardtop to the right similtanously might also help if you can't turn the locking pin
sufficiently around. ( about 90degrees approx)
Good thing in my case was, that when I finally got the damn thing off, an original unused as brand new softtop revealed itself, indicating
the hardtop probably had hardly if ever been off the car.

Hans

[Naj ✝︎]

Yes, you need to turn the hard top thru 90° to release the latch

naj

[stickandrudderman]

The retainer that holds the release cable is really weak; if someone tries to move the small chrome lever before releasing the pressure with the big lever, then the outer cable will slip through that retainer and you will not be able to release the locking pawl. Once you have the hard top off, be sure to examine the mechanism closely to familiarise yourself with it.