Yeah, I have the Soft topper. I love it. The directions are confusing at first, so read them a few times. The one thing I got lost on was the bars (two) that combine into ONE with the four little screws in the middle. You have to put those two pieces together first. The directions were not clear enough for dumb old me to figure that part out.
Otherwise it's really easy.
My directions:
DO THIS ON A SUNNY DAY. The heat helps the top stretch and becomes a LOT easier to work with.
1. Put the two flat bars together in the middle with the 4 screws.
2. Put on the weather stripping on the bending bar, exactly to the REAR edge of the bar. (Be sure you get that right, it only goes on one way!) Put the little "lip" of the rubber facing down and towards the FRONT of the truck (so in the middle of the bar, basically). Go slowly, a foot or two at a time, and peel the backing and stick it on nice and straight. Leave the last 1' un-stuck to the bar, and about 6" - 12" past the ends so you can trim them exactly when you get the rest of the parts on the truck.
3. Put the bending bar on over the cab. Start in the middle, go to the edges.
4. Put the side rails on, but
do NOT fully tighten them yet - just get them snug. Note how they are labelled "front left".
NOTE: I personally went to Home Depot and picked up some washers to go between the side cab bolts and the side-bar bolt holes. The bolt hole fittings are pretty thin, and over time will likely be damaged, so adding a nice washer helps spread the load across both sides of the bolt hole fittings for less stress when tightened.
5. Put the curved roof bars together and then on the side rails,
paying attention to slip the four black cloth protective covers AND the two center-to-rear straps (slipped around to the center bar) on FIRST!
6. Put the top on. Start at the cab and put the front row of left-to-right snaps on.
7. Pull the entire top over the roof bars. On the rear edge, you have to put the black center-to-rear-between-the-bar straps on WHILE you are snapping the rear edge of the canvas to the rear roof bar. Leave them super loose, you will tighten these LAST.
8. Pull the top up towards the back of your truck and attach the rear side hold-down straps to the rear of the side rails.
NOTE: This is easy to do if you are standing in the rear of your truck with the top in the middle.
9. Now attach the first 3-4 side snaps starting at the front of the truck, working back.
At this point you may notice the cab-to-side-bars alignment is off for one or both sides. Either you can't reach the first snap, or it's too close and the top sticks out too far. Slide the side rails forward or back to get the top to fit as smooth as possible. (When I did this the first time, one side had a big "wave" to the surface because the side rail was too far forward.)
10. Trim the extra-long rubber weather stripping on the front bar now to fit to the top of the side bars.
11. Do the rest of the side snaps. Towards the rear this will get hard as the likely will be too far away. You will likely have to pull down the rear top edge (top bar) and tighten the rear side hold-down straps at the same time. I have to get these REALLY snug while being careful to not break anything!
NOW drill the hole for the front top-bar to side-bar screw and screw the end of the top bar into the side bars. This is perfectly aligned, and next time you have to put the top on you can do this earlier and not have to worry about the alignment of the side bars.
12. Finally, tighten the center-to-rear-bar straps to get the center of the top to stick up - this helps prevent water from pooling on the top if it rains.
The only other things I do are:
Wrap the loose strap ends around themselves (if they are long) or tuck them into the rolled-up topper sides (if they are short) to prevent fraying.
Attach the leading edge straps to the front edge of the top (which the manual says to do only when the sides are up.) The design here is bad - these should be INSIDE like the rear ones, I don't know why they put them outside...
Last tip: When it rains, water WILL come in. It soaks through the black straps and drips INSIDE your cab. I tried sealing the seams and the straps ... no luck. I keep my truck covered with a tarp to prevent this. Even still, if you leave the sides up, and water comes through the tarp, you'll get a lot of rain in your truck. I learned this the hard way ... so put the sides down and THEN cover it!
Enjoy!
those were some of the first mods I did.
