mulchie

The soft top on my 71LT-1 has shrunk from 18 years of storage. It won't latch. Any ideas on how to stretch it out???

The Wanderer

Wow... that's a good question. Only thing I can think of is maybe parking the car out in the sun, letting the top get as hot as possible, and hope it stretches before it rips. I wonder if saddle soap or leather conditioner would help?

ScubaJKD

I had this same problem in the winter. Myself and two other freinds cleaned and conditioned the entire top and made sure it was as pliable as possible. Then we used a hair dryer to heat the top while my buddies pushed and streched the top until it latched. After latching it was acting like it was gonna bust at the seems so we applied another layer of conditioner and placed some wieght on the rear lip to help it form back into shape without busting the mounting pins in the decklid. After that we let it sit with the top latched down and kept applying conditioner over the next couple of weeks. Now all is fine and back to normal. Hope this helps.