One day I noticed that the passenger side flap would not close. When I tried to open the top it would jam and I had to manually open the flap in order to close the top. Before I closed it, I looked at the open flap. As shown, there is Rod with ball joints at each end. The ball screw at the right had worked its way out preventing the flap from opening or closing properly. The screw was so tiny and in a bad position that there was no way to just screw it back in. So I pried off the other end and was able to pry off the ball screw at a table with a pliers. Then I screwed the screw back in with lots of locktite, tightened it with a tiny spanner and pressed the ball joint back in. I’m sure a dealer would not go to the trouble to fix it and would just order a new flap assembly. Probably $500 part.


This rod with two ball joint ends controls the flaps. The ball screw on the right worked it’s way loose. The flap would not close and would get jammed with the top upon opening

 

Wow, interesting, thanks!

Gonna go check my flaps now!

 

No need to check the left hand side as this screw is tightened each time the top is raised and lowered. It’s only the right side that is loosened. This is a design failure. There should be a left threaded screw on the right. This will happen to ALL convertible tops eventually so do check. T

 

Can someone put a circle around the screw in the picture? I want to check mine when she comes out of hibernation, but I'm not sure which screw to check based on the description. Thanks!

 

Just follow the Rod with the two ball joint ends. At the right end is the screw. The screw screws into the body. The screw on the left screws down. You cannot see the screw only the ball joint on this picture. You might be able to use a thin 2 or 4 mm wrench. I would also use loctite which might delay the unscrewing for a year or two.

 

Wow, that's a complicated linkage! It's the kind of design that Audi would come up with the sun visor mirror!

BMW had something slightly more complex that opened the filler flap....I nearly forgot, the VW Phaeton trunk lid linkage, now that was a truly useless POS.

wombat

 

Hello,
BMW had a little more complicated mechanism for opening the filler flap.... I almost forgot about the VW Phaeton trunk lid connection, which was a complete waste of time.