We have an original 86 front gas engine Grand Villa. Our ceiling headliner is beginning to sag. Center seam with covered buttons / snaps. If we pull down what are we finding underneath. ??? Padding and what else ?
If you take down the center cap you mentioned, you should be able to stretch each side of the headliner to the center. I've seen some previous posts where others have done that as a fix.
I done did that.
Take the center strip down. Remove ten million staples. Vacuum out the deteriorated foam rubber and failed adhesive.
Pull the vinyl fabric towards the center. Carefully staple the material in place--NEAR THE CENTER-- or the staples will show when you put the center strip back in place.
Try to get a whole bunch of those fabric covered screw on buttons and add a row from front to back, halfway between the center and the cabinets on each side. Keep the "button" rows straight. You will be looking at them a long time.
I had that problem. After a couple of temporary repairs, I took center strip down from front cap back to hallway. I bought some 1"x3", lumber and milled it down by 1/4" or so, ran a router down the bottom edges to make a nice radius, stained it walnut to match the cabinets then attached it to ceiling steel frame with countersunk stainless screws.
jk
sorry for the run on sentence