Hood alignment help

ANy body experts on here that have advice on aligning the hood? The gap on the passenger side hood to fender is larger than the drivers side. I have all the bolts to hinges loose (except for hood to hinge which are tight) and it won't scoot over enough to have even amount of gap on both sides. The metal windsheild cover is also removed.

Do I need to bore the holes wider on the hinge base to get the hood to move over?

I need to get it aligned before cutting for hood pins.

Any insight would be appreciated.

 

[atc250r]

I had to enlarge the holes on my hinges when I went to a CF hood. I believe I had to move mine back but its still the same thing. Did you try adjusting the hinges themselves? I think there may be some room for adjustment where the hinges bolt to the cowl.

John

 

[fivestardsm]

First off, is it an OEM hood? If so, you might not need to align the hood, but the fenders. If you look at the line where the fender meets the A pillar, they should be even on both sides. Also check at the door/fender corner.

If it is the fenders that are slightly out, it is easy to just loosen the top bolts and move them around a little bit. If the fenders look to be completly straight and aligned to the doors, then you can "pry" the hood over to the larger gap side with a piece of wood. Use a 1X2 or such or something that is Mallable just so you dont chip the paint. You can also put a shop towel between it and the hood to protect the paint.

You would want to tighten the hood to the hnges first though. I have had to do this a few times and it is not really that big of a deal.

I would try these few steps before I reeamed out the holes.

 

Thanks guys for the suggestions.

I removed the hood tonight and removed the hinges just to inspect them. Nothing that interesting, the top holes are round and the bottom are not oval but enlongated round for adjustment. I put them back on and then installed the hood but I left the hinges loose at the base so I could move the hood around.

I can get the hood to move over slightly but then when it comes down the latch is over too far to the right so it moves the hood back when it grabs thus causing the gap again.

I suppose I could remove the factory hood latch and just use the aerocatch hood pins but then I'd have to fab a new vertical support bar because removing the latch mechanism eliminates the hole for the support bar (and one bolt for my IC) to attach to.

Or I can hog out the holes on the hood latch and scoot it over. Or I can live with the gap.

 

[toybreaker]

Quoting fivestardsm:
First off, is it an OEM hood? If so, you might not need to align the hood, but the fenders. If you look at the line where the fender meets the A pillar, they should be even on both sides. Also check at the door/fender corner.

If it is the fenders that are slightly out, it is easy to just loosen the top bolts and move them around a little bit. If the fenders look to be completly straight and aligned to the doors, then you can "pry" the hood over to the larger gap side with a piece of wood. Use a 1X2 or such or something that is Mallable just so you dont chip the paint. You can also put a shop towel between it and the hood to protect the paint.



I would try these few steps before I reeamed out the holes.



excellent post!

You can measure the engine compartment with a trammel bar to verify the alignment of the opening and fender attachment points. It may be a combination of factors. Trying to use one surface as a referernce only works if that surface is accurate and true to the centerline of the car.

If the heighth at the rear looks funky, the factory had shims under the top rear fender mount on almost all the cars I've ever had apart. Many times, those get lost when the sheetmetal is removed, and the original alignment is lost. This can lead to all kinds of funky gaps and mismatches in the alignment of the front body panels, and make it hard to nail the fender/hood gap evenly.

Good luck, and post a pic of the problem.

We've got a couple of body techs onboard here, and they might have some ideas if they can see how it looks. to start

 

[BoostedAWD91]

i know this is off topic, but u should post some pictures of the car, i havent seen any pictures of the car since Harry owned it. a beautiful car like that should be shared with us all /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif

 

After looking at the factory hood latch I don't think I would be able to "hog out" the holes in order to move it over because those holes are threaded nuts welded on the back.

I may be in over my head, since I'm going to have to google trammel bar. And I was hoping that I wouldn't have to touch the fenders. I'll snap some pics of the gap I'm fighting.

Boostedawd91, as soon as everything is put back together I'll post some pics of the car.

Oh and this is the hirev cf jdm hood I am trying to fit.

 

[fivestardsm]

As for the reaming, you wouldnt do it to the hood itself, you would do it to the hinges.

 

Of course. Only problem is once I enlarge the holes on the hinges to move the hood over the latch brings it back over.

I also noticed that if I remove the latch I need to unscrew the rubber bump stops pretty far out because the hood drops lower than the fenders. The hood pins would probably help catch it though.

 

[atc250r]

I don't see why you couldn't open up the holes in the latch and move it over. That has nothing to do with the fact that the bolts thread into fixed nuts attached to the radiator support. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/confused.gif

John

 

Mike are you saying that you loosen the hinges, align the hood, close it & it shifts? If yes, have you tried to align the hood, tighten the hinges then close it? I would be a little worried though since there will be unnecessary stress. Another option is to undo the fendes & adjust them.

 

[atc250r]

Unless I'm mistaken, he is trying to get the CF hood to line up properly but from what I can remember the stock hood lined up perfect when Harry had it but there was a little issue getting the CF one just right. Since the stocker fits fine I'm going to ASSume that the fenders and stuff are straight but the mounting holes in the CF hood and possibly the striker in the CF hood are a little out of whack. If that's the case then I would just adjust the hood latch to make it all work.

John

 

[fivestardsm]

Quoting 3of1000:
Of course. Only problem is once I enlarge the holes on the hinges to move the hood over the latch brings it back over.

I also noticed that if I remove the latch I need to unscrew the rubber bump stops pretty far out because the hood drops lower than the fenders. The hood pins would probably help catch it though.



It sounds like your latch might be a littl eout of adsjustment then. You can loosen it up and adjust it a little, but some times it takes a little tweaking.

 

Quoting atc250r:
I don't see why you couldn't open up the holes in the latch and move it over. That has nothing to do with the fact that the bolts thread into fixed nuts attached to the radiator support. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/confused.gif

John



John, you are correct. I just took a look at it and the actual latch mechanism has plain holes in it. The piece that it bolts to is where the nuts are welded on the back side. I took a small amount of material out of the holes on the latch and got it lined up as best as possible and tigthened everything up. Several of my panels are off so in the future I'm may take it to a body shop that can line it up for a perfectionist like myself. Tomorrow I'll tackle the aerocatch hood pins.

Thanks for the responses guys.

 

[Hertz]

How is the fitment front to back? Does the length of the hood match up?

 

The length is pretty good, I've had no complaints. Oh, you mean the hood. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/hsugh.gif One part of the hood is short but I think its my fender. The gaps where each fender meet the a pillars don't have the same amount of space between them. And my pass front door to pass rear door gap is larger than it's supposed to be. I realized long ago that at some point I would need to search for a body shop I can trust to line some stuff up better.

 

[turbowop]

You have to remember that these are just GVR4's, not BMW's. I don't think any of them have perfect panel gaps.

 

[boostedinaz]

^^^^

If the car was taken down to a shell and rebuilt from the ground up, I would hope the panel gaps would be perfect.

 

[turbowop]

If somebody wanted to spend the time, I guess. Not everybody has the same level of OCD, so panel alignment that might look good to one person, may not look good to another. I mean, how far off are we talking here? Nothing looks out of place in the pictures I've seen of #3. At least not bad enough to stand out in any obvious way. Sometimes aligning panels to within millimeters can be a huge bitch. If the previous owner got it to where he thought it looked good, but you don't think it's good enough, I guess that's something you can work on as the new owner of the car.

I know my car has gaps and such I'd like to make perfect, but it's not something I worry about too much.

 

I just spent some time reviewing pics of the car with the old hood and I see some similarities to get an idea of what the difference are. Its all good, I will line it up best as possible and move forward with the install.

I just wanted to brainstorm so thanks for all the replies.