So in order to participate in the driver's school and track days at Englishtown (on Friday yay!) I just got my RMR Style Bar and got it installed.
Getting it was way more challenging and stressful than installing it. If you don't care about the silly shipping story just scroll down a little bit for the real details.
So I placed the order on Thursday, they said it would be there in a week. Ok sounds good. So I call back Monday to get a tracking number and I'm told it was all scratched up and that it's getting re-powder coated (glad they noticed and took care of it!), so he said he'll ship it 2nd day UPS so I'll still get it Thursday. So they did the right thing. Thank you
So it ships and I get my tracking number and Chris Winter, who runs Crazy Horse Racing performance shop and now runs the new road course at Englishtown offers to install the bar for me the day before the school which is awesome. So I call UPS to tell them to "ground" the package, which means don't put it on the truck so I can pick it up at the office first thing instead of wait till the afternoon when the guy normally comes to my house.
Well she says you can't ground a package until there has been a delivery attempt! Then she won't give me the phone number to the local office for me to try there. So that night after work I just drive there and obtain the info and phone number on what to do.
So the next day i wake up earlier than normal and call UPS at 7am as told and the give the manager my tracking number and she says she'll call me back when she finds the package. An hour later I call back and she says, yeah it'll be soon. She actually does call back 20 minutes later and says I can come and get it at 1PM when the office opens! The whole point was that I get it first thing, so she says to come at 10am instead and use the employee entrance.
So I show up and walk in and get attacked by security guards who freaked out because I wasn't wearing brown
I go see the manager she walks over to a platform and SURPRISE! the package is GONE. She says "I swear it was just here" turns out one of the drivers took it for some reason. So she tracks down the driver and it turns out he is about 5 minutes from my house about to deliver it! So I drive all the way back to my town and meet him in the middle of the street in downtown South Orange to get the package!
So of course the box is too big to fit with the top down (it was raining) so I open the window and put the box in so it's sticking out the window and drive to a condo parking garage that is covered. I unpack the bar and parts and fit it into my trunk and drive to the shop to get it installed!
So after that miserable morning things did get better, the install went pretty smooth and it's all setup and works. I followed along LIL Goat's thread on the Sol forum to see if we have the same issues (the RMR manual and pictures are not very good at all)
RMR style bar installed - Pontiac Solstice Forum
It looks like every bar they ship out is a little different. It didn't line up the same way as his, and one side is lined up differently than the other. Where he found the plates hanging over towards the rear, I didn't get that but one side is not lining up properly with the rubber. So the whole thing is slightly crooked which is pushing the convertible frame.
My photos are posted here and you can see the difference between the two sides:
RMR Sol/Sky Rollbar
Two problems:
1. Because the right side plate is slightly crooked the hole for where the little door flaps is doesn't line up properly (you can see this clearly in the 3rd and 6th photo) Luckily we noticed it was crooked right away and didn't drill the flaps. I will use 3M Dual Lock (same stuff EZ Pass uses but smaller) to hold it down for now.
2. When I pop the thingers out of the trunk lid with the remote the passenger side does not go up fully so I have to push it towards the front of the car to get the trunk lid up. Then it barely clears when I do push it because inside the canvas it's rubbing against something that the other side does not so I have to push it quite hard to get it to clear. So this is a real PITA.
I think I'm going to call RMR and see if they can send me another bar, the driver's side of the car is fine and the top works fine there, so i think if the next bar is straighter there shouldn't be any problems with the top.
I guess this kind of thing happens, I guess every style bar is one of a kind! I think it looks good, specially in this color with the black car. So hopefully RMR will not give me any problems with exchanging the bar.
Linear Mode
