Boot/trunk won't open, soft top won't fully close, hydraulic pump removed

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CLKEnthusiast

New Member
Joined
Aug 13, 2020
Messages
1
Location
London, UK
Car
CLK 230 (A208)
Hi all,

For info based in London, UK.

I have a 2003 CLK 230 dark blue cabriolet, which is a great car I got a few years ago. A few weeks ago the hood started acting very sluggishly, which I thought was perhaps a little rust setting in. Lots of WD40 failed to stop this, and after 4 hood opening/closing it completely stopped. I was able to shut it manually but had a 2 cm gap between the hard top and the roof closing. I was able to sort this by moving the roll bar all the way to the lowest position which closed it.

Fast forward two weeks, I have carefully followed the very useful Top Hydraulics Youtube videos (wife from CA and in the the US would have driven to Oregon to see them). Changed all fuses - nothing. Siphoned out old hydraulic fluid and refilled with Febi ZH-M - nothing (of note the nut/bolt combo to close the reservoir was missing and fluid was low, I think someone may have played with it in the past and not replaced this). I had taken out the motor to give it a good once over and clean and ensure all was okay (and replace if necessary), and in doing so needed to manually open the top. I did this and played around with the opening mechanisms on both boot/trunk and hard top release behind back seats (I don't have the combined tool so did with a 6mm hex and 10 mm wrench (which is small, so tried to find ways to open and close a few times, and am concerned maybe left in wrong position).

I was able to close the hard top and move the soft top back so it partially latched onto the boot. However it won't close all the way and am again left with a 2 cm gap. I think the soft top bow lock is already closed and not preventing full closure of the soft top bow, or the hard top is not fixed into position and affected soft top bow closure.

But now I'm stuck -

a) can't move the roll bar (it is down anyway but can't move further which seemed to lock in place before, either electronically or manually, maybe as I have removed the pump)
b) can't put either metal key into boot look, despite copious amounts of WD-40 (I think it is something about the way it is locked, it only goes in 1cm or so), nor unlock with the front panel mechanisms nor the key
c) can't close the soft top (am not big but have literally climbed on top and put all my weight on the mechanism to no effect)
d) therefore can't open the boot to release the mechanism to get the soft top back open.

I am working full-time on COVID response (am a doctor) so doing this all in evenings and don't really want to take a day off to go to someone to have to sort this (and having spent the time to do this would really like to figure out what issue/leak is). Does anyone have any ideas for how I can either open the boot, gain access through back seats, force the soft-top closed, or somehow open the half-locked mechanism?

Any help most gratefully received,

All best, thanks!
 

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