1969 roadster

[John B.]

I'm fairly new to Corvettes. I'm looking at a 69 roadster with a removable hard top. The seller is telling me that there is no soft top. When I questioned him more about it, he explained that it has NO TOP at all, no bows hardware at all, just the removable hard top. He explained he believed that someone bought the car because they wanted a convertible but wanted the storage space so they ordered it without the assembly or removed it. Does that sound right to those of you with more experience than me?? If that is something you've seen before, how much trouble and at what cost will I acquire the top assembly and a soft top for it? Thanks for you time. It looks nice with the top down, but for driving topless, I'd want a plan for rain.

[Dick W.]

Re: 1969 roadster

1969's were available with a soft top only, hard top only, or a combination of the two at an additional cost

[John B.]

Re: 1969 roadster

Thanks for the quick reply. I'll do some homework on Soft tops. If anyone has replaced theirs and had a good experience, I'd appreciate hearing where they purchased the bows and soft top.

[Kevin M.]

Re: 1969 roadster

If your looking at judging, you may want to leave it alone, hardtop only cars are kind of neat. If you find the tank stickers or built sheet you would always have to explain why you added the soft top. My 2 cents

Kevin

[John B.]

Re: 1969 roadster

For a Monza red exterior and red interior, what color of soft tops are correct?

[Joe L.]

Re: 1969 roadster

John-----

The interior/exterior combination you described could have been ordered with either a black, white, or beige soft top.

By the way, I can tell you for absolute certain that in 1969 one could have ordered a convertible with hard top only. I did just that in 1969 and still have the car.

However, the car now has a soft top in addition to the hard top. I have the hard top stored away and will probably never use it again [not for sale, though]. I installed the soft top on the car in 1986. I purchased a restored, original frame, NOS top, all NOS or new GM weatherstrip, all NOS or new GM hardware and had the top installed on the frame by an automotive upholstery shop. It cost me about $2,000 to do everything then. I expect that it would be about $3,000 to do it today.

[John B.]

Re: 1969 roadster

Joe,
Thanks for the information. I'm thinking a soft top could be a birthday present to myself. I've seen several Red/Red 69's with white tops, but I can't recall any beige or black ones. I'll have to look at some pictures to see what they look like.
John

[Chuck G.]

Re: 1969 roadster

My 69 was a hartop only car. It's "documented" on the tank sticker.

Before I bought the car, someone had added a complete soft top assembly.

SO, the seller is correct that the car could be ordered as a soft top only, hard top only, or with both tops. Chuck

[John B.]

Re: 1969 roadster

Chuck,
Thanks for your input. I'm new to NCRS and have never been to a judging event. I'm trying to learn and get up to speed on how cars are considered "correct" Am I correct in saying that this 69 I'm looking at (haven't seen it yet, but have had several phone converstions and pics over the internet) will have a tank sticker that will indicate if it was oredered only with a hard top, the trim tag will not indicate a "correct" color for a soft top....that is a free choice between white, black and beige? Also, is it considered a negative for judging if it was ordered with a hard top only, but you've put an appropriate NOS soft top on? Maybe it's time for me to order the 69 judging manual. I have lots of questions I'm sure it can answer.
John

[Chuck G.]

Re: 1969 roadster

NCRS doesn't judge tank stickers. I've had my 69 judged several times with the beige soft top. I keep the HT in the basement.

My 69 has taken several Top Flight awards, scoring in the 97% range at the Nationals in Hershey a few years ago.

So......as long as you do the soft top correctly, nobody will know.

(OOPS, now I told everyone on the DB )

Chuck

[Jack H.]

Re: 1969 roadster

The use of 'tank stickers' began in the '67 model year, so technically the '69 you're looking at should have left the factory with one. BUT, it's not always the case that the tank sticker is still there....

I could have fallen off, been removed by a prior owner or the tank was replaced somewhere in the car's prior ownership history. Then, there's the more typical case where the sticker remains, but is SO deteriorated that it's illegible!

On judging, there's another book, the NCRS Judging Reference Manual, that gives descriptions of the club's various awards, rules of conduct for owners and judges, and ennumerates judging rules that apply to all Corvettes regardless of year of production. There, you'll find it's a full deduction for the addition or deletion of an option that a given car was not factory equipped with.

The idea is to prevent owners from 'making up' cars during their restoration effort (making the car the way they would have ordered it vs. the way it was actually built and delivered). So, technically speaking, the addition of a soft top to a car that was originally a hard top only vehicle is a 'no no'.

But, it's pretty hard to detect the addition of a soft top if the parts used are correct and the installation is done right...

[Chuck G.]

Re: 1969 roadster

I never realized that it was a HT only car till I "got into" the tank sticker decoding, with the help of Bill Vyn and others.

When I bought the car, it had a saddle tan conv. top and a body color hardtop. In tracking down previous owners, all the way back to 1975, it "always" had the saddle tan top, along with the HT. Maybe an "early addition". I dunno.

I was never able to trace the ownership prior to 75, although I do know the original selling dealership, in Downers Grove, Illinois.

From 69 to 75? ??? Chuck