The first step was putting the boat where I could work on it out of the weather. With the top removed, it fit into the garage under my house, which would create some significant issues later. The boat is on a dolly I made to facilitate moving it around.
A good friend did some photo editing to see what a metal supported hard top with soft enclosure would look like. The proportions in the following mock-up are off as there is inadequate headroom. The real top would have to be much taller.
After too many iterations to present here, this is the final mock-up and became the guide for the end result.
Bill Potter was kind enough to offer an opinion, and actually sent a plan with a hard top superimposed on the standard layout. He suggested acrylic windows for less weight, but I opted for glass for better durability. Weight should not be as much of a concern with the I/O being replaced with an OB on a bracket.
