Reparing buckled roof

BrisOBriens · Aug 25, 2015

Hi all,
We buckled our roof recently (2 month old SE, sob!) and I'd like to hear any success stories in getting repairs done. The damage happened while closing the roof and catching the rear edge on the handlebar of a bike that was stored on the rear-hanging bike rack. It seems minor, but the roof has bowed enough not to seal tightly against the main vehicle when closed, with about 2 inches of gap at the peak.
First estimate from the body shop was £4200 for a completely new roof. Not where we want to go...
The roof is aluminium, which causes the body-shop estimators to suck in their breath and speak of work-hardening and other panel-beating unmentionables, but looking at it I really think it must be possible.
Anyway - has anyone successfully had a bent roof beaten into shape again, and do you have any recommended shops?
cheers!

Skylark2.0 · Aug 25, 2015

Yaart!

Californiaman · Aug 25, 2015

I had a bend in the front left of mine (when it closed on one of the tiny rubber grommets that tell out if the scissor mechanism) and a slight crease across the middle of the front when I was experimenting to see if I could store bedding up there (doh!)

AB Crush did a superb job of sorting these out for the princely sum of £190 (although the roof was off at the time for the roof rot to be sorted)

The panel is only aluminium - go see a good old fashioned panel beater or perhaps even a dent doctor!

Martin · Aug 25, 2015

As Mark says try a dent doctor first (they will come out to you normally) , I spoke to someone at COTF that had a crease removed from the roof for £65, I could not see any trace of the repair.

How bad is the damage? maybe upload a pic?

Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

andyinluton · Aug 25, 2015

If you really are looking at £4200 surely it would be an insurance job?

BrisOBriens · Aug 25, 2015

Here's the damage...actually worse than it looks, I think the deformation extends maybe a foot in from the rear edge.

I like the sound of 'dent doctors', will search for that.

Went to a VW-approved shop on the weekend, receptionist guy had a go with a hammer and a pair of grips, made a mess of the finish but didn't do much for the problem!

cheers!

calikev · Aug 26, 2015

I'm sure that can be popped back

motacyclist · Aug 26, 2015

If it was going to cost £4200 I would have a go at it myself. My first thoughts would be to lift the roof enough to fit a wooden batten underneath going right across from side to side, then use something like a G clamp placed one jaw at the peak with the other on the batten then carefully tighten the clamp. Place something like thick rubber felt at the points of contact and keep loosening to see what the effect has been. Good luck with whatever method you use.

BrisOBriens · Sep 10, 2015

Went to the VW van centre in Guildford...they put me onto Auto Cosmetex (http://www.autocos.co.uk)....very helpful and friendly people, I highly recommend them. Roof has been nicely straightened out, all for less than £100. Woohoo!

Meoncoast · Sep 10, 2015

that is a good result

tobyprivett · Jun 18, 2023

BrisOBriens said:
View attachment 9661 View attachment 9662 View attachment 9663

Here's the damage...actually worse than it looks, I think the deformation extends maybe a foot in from the rear edge.

I like the sound of 'dent doctors', will search for that.

Went to a VW-approved shop on the weekend, receptionist guy had a go with a hammer and a pair of grips, made a mess of the finish but didn't do much for the problem!

cheers!

Bumping this because I have just done the exact same bend - forcing the roof shut when the top of the bike rack was in the way. Duh.

Curious if anyone has a more recent experience getting this fixed?

Update: I rang the folks at Cosmetix (mentioned above) and they don't do this work. The roof is, apparently, a stretchy material that doesn't respond well to the usual re-shaping techniques.