Leaky roof and saggy headliner ... Possible fix?!?!?

[Crayfish]

So I am getting tired of being in the wet knee club and having a saggy, crumbly headliners..yes I know if I wanted a dry car I would not have purchased a defender... I have tried putting dumb dumb around the seams but to not avail. I have read and followed the water ingress manual..also to no avail. Still a wet knee during the last storm.

As an act of desperation I removed the headliner and found the water was coming in through the outer channel where the rear washer hose was sitting in. However, I could not trace it back to the origins of the leak. When I removed the liner I discovered much of the foam was crumbling away and the back liner was sagging. I brought the head liner to a trim shop and they did not have the vinyl style liner and could only offer me a fabric based liner...at a cost of $700. But if I did not fix the leak all this expense would be as waste of money. Then it dawned on me... Plastidip. This stuff is suppose to be majic. So I pulled the trigger this morning and brought my tuck and headliner to this guy "Jay" that advertises on craigslist. He is going to Plastidip the entire roof of my truck and will strip the crumbly vinyl headliner and Plastidip the backing in a matching grey color. He suggested I do the roof a matte black as it would be easier to clean and will be more durable than the white color. I have see my Epsom green truck with a black roof, so I figured why not.

I will pick up the truck later this evening and will post some pics of the roof and the headliner. I will wait until after a hard rain to ensure the leak has been sealed before re-installing the headliner.

The price was negotiated to $500.00 for the entire job. It will either be a great deal or a moderate cost learning experience.

Pete

"A pretender in a defender"

[mepham55]

Sounds interesting, I'm curious how this will work and look. My only thought is Plasti-dip is not very durable and you can pull it off by hand from metal. I've seen some you tube folks spray plastidip over their entire car and then peel it off later. As long as you don't scratch the outer roof and the fellow puts on a thick coat it should stay water proof though.

Matt

[ANDYD]

Hey Pete,

Hopefully it fixes the problem for you, it would be great if you post a couple of photos after the application and give us some feedback in a few months on how well its doing...
Hopefully after all this you dont find its coming from somewhere else (like the top of the windsheild?).

cheers,
Andy

[Crs]

Very interesting idea. I've wondered if the plasti dip would work. Please keep us posted.