Not too long ago I had the headliner recovered. At the time I thought my sunroof liner was still good, I should have known better. Following another track day of driving at high speed with the windows down, the liner was beginning to flap around quite badly. I feared that I would have to drop the entire headliner again to get at the sunroof liner. Fortunately I discovered that it could be removed by first removing the outer painted metal cover.
This required quite a bit of fiddling, but eventually it came out. The Bentley manual does have a little blurb on the subject, I recommend taking a look. My first attempt at reassembling the sunroof resulted in the liner not retracting when going into vent mode. I feared that I had broken the flimsy plastic mechanism that catches the cable that pulls the liner back. Fortunately it was just a matter of not assembling the parts in the exact order to get everything lined up.
First you must ever so slightly open the sunroof so that the inner liner can be easily slid out of the way. For a bit more access I pulled out the inner rubber trim piece as well. Then you have access to the two Torx screws and three nuts holding the exterior metal piece in. There is a Torx screws at each at the front corners then three nuts at the rear. The two screws can be difficult to reach and even harder to install.
With the exterior metal piece removed, slide the liner back forward. There are several smaller Torx screws attaching the liner to the pieces that it slides back and forth on. Remove these and the liner can be lifted out.
Now the fun parts of removing the deteriorated foam backing. Actually this was much easier than anticipated because the liner panel is metal, unlike the fiber-card headliner. So a gasket scraper with a new blade made quick work of scraping off the residue.
Off to the upholstery shop to have the panel recovered. Pay close attention to where the OEM liner laid, as it doesn’t cover all the way to the right and left edges and wraps over the front and rear. The panel is also not completely flat, but has ridges. The liner isn’t glued down into these, but stretched over them to form and even surface. The photo below is of the cleaned panel.
Put the liner panel back in, making sure you get the small white plastic piece on the left side lined up with the opening/closing track so that it retracts properly. It’s nearly impossible to explain this in words or even photos, as it is contained in the cassette and under the exterior sheet metal. Take your time and study how it works and it should become clear.
Install the exterior metal panel, attaching the forward Torx screws first. The mounting holes are oblong by design, which allows for adjusting the fit of the panel to be level and inline with the roof. The outer rear mounting points also allow for adjustment by way of a metal shim. This wedge shaped shim can be slid left or right to raise or lower the panel. Get everything lined up and tighten it down. Be sure to not have the panel ride too high (it’s a very very fine line) to where it’ll rub on the inner cassette when retracting the sunroof.
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