First off this post is not intended to be an advertisement of any product that is currently for sale in any form or fashion.
Further, I have been looking into the
possibility of producing these but, as of yet, haven't been able to do so in a way that would be affordable.
I am still pursuing the idea.
My business is in CNC machining. Mostly contract work for industrial customers but, being a 67-72 enthusiast has compelled me to make some custom pieces specific to them.
I will share what I did to mount my bikini top to my Blazer without drilling holes into the header.
Starting out by doing a bunch of measuring and CAD drawing, I was able to closely recreate the geometry of the top of the windshield header on my '70 K/5 Blazer.
I then created a machine program and some fixtures to fasten on a piece of 1/8" aluminum sheet. I had to do it in two sections because of the limit of my largest CNC mill.
I milled the shape and put the holes and slots in at the calculated positions.
Then using a larger, thicker piece of aluminum, I machined a fixture to clamp the piece on and bend the proper angles to match the header geometry.
I used a malleable grade of aluminum and used a soft hammer to shape it to the fixture.
The center tabs are slotted and bent downward to align with the factory hard top mounting holes. and I simply bolted through the outer visor/hard top mount.
The bikini top I have uses a "J" channel along the front to fasten to the mount piece so there are no snaps to attach, but it would only be a matter of drilling and riveting them on if the application called for them.
This is only the prototype and again I'm still trying to work out a way to produce these that would be both profitable to me and affordable to the buyer. I won't go into the specifics of the manufacturing costs but it would be a substantial investment on my part, especially for such a niche product.
Any way here are a couple of pictures of the concept.
These are before the center tabs were slotted and bent into position and one is after the bikini top is loosely attached onto the header.
The additional hole are simply used to clamp the piece onto the fixture for machining.
