Pop Top

Back in October the Miata Club received an unsolicited email advertising something called a California Pop Top. They were offering Club members a 10% discount and if we did a group buy they would ship all to the same address for the cost of shipping one. Seemed like a good deal, but we had no takers. I know I’m the only regular user of a cockpit cover in the Club since Russ defected to the Black Forrest, but I was not interested because we had just replaced our aging unit about a month earlier. One other member did express a slight interest, so I told him if he bought let me know as I wanted to see if this thing worked as advertised. He never did buy on.

Fast forward to two weeks ago. Our new car cover mounted a different than our previous one and we never really got used to it. It might have been operator error but the hold down hooks kept falling off the wheel wells randomly. Donna asked about that one we had heard about before and maybe we should look at getting one. I wrote the contact at California Pop Top to see if the deal was still valid. Yep. I wrote the other individual who expressed a slight interest to see if he wanted in on the deal. Yep. Ordered them Sunday, shipped Monday and arrived yesterday.

I have put it on and taken it off twice as practice in the garage. Way radical. The first time was tricky, the second time went smoother, but it didn’t seem to cover the back of the cockpit as well as the others. Left a little sliver of opening exposed. Reading the instructions I think that is from me not pulling the cords in the back tight enough. I need more practice.

The Pop Top is made of Tyvek so it is lighter and more compact than either of the two previous cockpit covers I’ve owned. I like it that it is more of a one person job than the earlier ones too. The others could be done by one, but it took a couple passes to get it lined up and locked down right. Donna likes the one person aspect too. It is also supposed to fit top up or down, so if it turns out to be real easy I can use it nearly every time I park for an extended period of time.