Aligning hood

[aarvig]

Anyone have some tips for aligning the hood and hood hinges.  I'm trying to get this situated "good enough" for the body shop and holy cow...it's way off.  Sits high towards the nose and to low on the drivers side.

[Greg K]

Aaron,...pictures would help.

[aarvig]

Ill try and post some today.  There is a formatting issue that occurs when using iPhone photos on this forum that prevents me from posting.  I need to find an easy work around.

[Greg K]

Look up HEIC to jpg, can do this on your phone or online converter.

[aarvig]

Here is a pic.  Low on drivers side, high on passenger side and shifted to passenger side.

[Greg K]

Just a couple questions...
How did the hood fit in the hole when not attached to the hinges?
Is the body loose or can you move it around a bit?
The hinge has some adjustment with spacers left and right if I recall.
It'll be a quite a bit of back forth to get it close.

[dawger]

May have to play around by putting shims under the parts of the hinge that attaches to the hood in order to bring the hood in better alignment as I had to do to get the hood to fit better in the opening with the body.

Michael

[aarvig]

The hood has never fit real well, even when it was sent home with me.  If I put it on a table the hood is actually warped-it teeters side to side.  The body is locked down and is not coming off at this point.  The hood is the last piece in the equation that needs to be installed so it will be tweaked to fit the car.  The hinges are the angle style but there is only a hole drilled in them-nothing ovalized to allow movement.  Maybe that's where I should start.  Does anyone have a list of adjustments and what they do to the final position of the hood on the car?

[Paul Proefrock]

There are many variables in the fit of the hood, many due to the 'twist' of the hood and also of the body. The hinges can be adjusted in the front to get that end to fit pretty well.

I use my own 'rubber spacers', mounted one about mid-point on the side, so when the hood clamps down in the back, the hood sits tight on this point (there may have been some negative bend in my hoods) and another at the rear near the latch so when the latch is engaged, the hood sits tight on this rubber.  Both sides are the same. When the latches are released, the hood will spring up a slight amount but when engaged it sits tight.

At this point, the hood is fixed in the front (hinges), at the sides (over rubber spacer) and at the rear by the latches. Your body guy can then finish the height of the hood and surrounding areas, getting them to match.

Over the life of the cars, I noticed the hood will eventually conform to this shape. The fiberglass will move depending on which areas are stressed, but it takes years for it to normalize.

I've attached pictures of the rubber spacers I made from 3/4" thick rubber (conveyor belting)

Paul

[s_reynolds]

I did something similar to what Paul did. Here are a couple of pics,

[s_reynolds]

Here is another.

[aarvig]

Thanks guys!  I will do that.  Alec gave me a call today and filled me on on just centering the hood over the opening and trimming down the sides to get it to fit into the space its supposed to fall into since there is extra material molded into the hood-for that purpose.  I will add some rubber spacers so the hood can "leverage" itself onto the lockdowns and let my body guy do the rest.  It looks like painting will occur in October!

[aarvig]

Got it!!  Close enough.  The body guy can finish the rest!