Tampa 928s

I had the hood off for a week to replace the liner and am still waiting for my decal that was supposed to be shipped last Sat.
I need to put my hood back on and deal with the decal later.
Of course my marks are gone from cleaning and painting and want to get the hood on straight. Any magic to this?

Imo000

Yup, remove the hood with the hingers on. The hinge bolt holes are round and not adjustable so the hood will go back perfectly aligned.

Mrmerlin

well since your at a different place than where you started try removing the hold down from the hood so you can close it with out it latching, then its a simple matter of trial and error colse the hood till it has even gaps all the way round, after you like what you see, reinstall the hood latch and with the bolts just loose from snug gently close it till the hood pin lines up to the hole, if you like what see then snug the bolts and make a test close, if all is good then tighten everything and install the hood shocks

Tampa 928s

What a pain I get it lined up lift the hood it moves back is too high or hood too far forward!

IcemanG17

it does take some time......remove the hood latch, that way you don't have to "pop" it everytime...with 2 people (one to hold the hood in the exact right spot...the other tightens the bolts)...its really not that bad....ideally you want the same gap across the front and down the sides.....& have the end of the hood line up with the edge of the fender at the rear.....

TheoJ

just like MrMerlin said. Bolts snug so that you can just move the hood with a bit of force, gently move it in place and open it carefully.

I put it too high up at the hinges, snug it loosely, close, make sure the front sits in place, put in a plastic spacer at both sides to maintain a gap, push the hood downward at the hinges, open carefully without disturbing the setting and tighten the 13mm nuts. It takes a few tries... I know..

Theo

ErnestSw

I'm gonna remove my hood this winter to replace my hood liner. Does the strategy suggested by IM000 work? Will it prevent replacement alignment problems?

Mrmerlin

if you remove the hood it is always a good idea to first remove the hood latch and make sure no matter what proceedure you use . If you close the hood and the latch is mis aligned then you may not get it to open properly

Tampa 928s

Latch is off I guess I need to remove the shocks I think it's misaligning it!
I'm waiting for some help to get this done!

Leon Speed

How is it misaligning? Along side the fenders or in height, front or back?

Definitely remove the shocks so that no additional force is on the hood.

If you were satisfied with the alignment before you took the hood off, you could leave the latch on. That way you have a fixed point and don't have to worry about lateral alignment and forward-backward alignment. Since you have it off..can you put it back on exactly where it was?

The trick is make little adjustments intermittently between both sides. That way the hood stays fixed on one side and is slighty adjusted on the other. Do this a couple of times and you'll see how it works.

dr bob

One thing that folks (including me...) often forget is that the hinges need to be lubricated to work properly. I replaced the shocks early in my stewardship period and had the hood sitting high immediately afterward. Hmmm... Spray a little teflon/lithium grease into the hinges and the binding is gone, hood sits down where it's supposed to. This applies to all cars, not just the ones where a part has been disturbed, cleaned or replaced. If you can't get a consistent fit, be sure to lubricate the hinges. At least then you'll be able to consistently see what's binding or out of adjustment.

TheoJ

DrBob: good point. Someone once wanted to sell me new hinges as they were crap and worn. Hood was hard to close properly. Just a bit of lubrication and they suddenly worked fine again. Never failed again.
Theo

toofer

Tampa 928s, I struggled getting my hood back into proper alignment untill I took the hood shocks loose. With the shocks disconnected a hard job became very easy. Toofer

Tampa 928s

It's done:

Remove latch
Remove shocks
Lube hinges
Lightly tighten bolts
Lower hood Press in place to postion
Have wife lift hood untill hinge bolts show, tighten
Reconnect Latch, may have to adj length using nut
Attach shocks
All done !
Some one may want to save this works and very easy!

Alan

On the later cars removing the hinges is more difficult on the passenger side - may still be worth it to save the realignment hassles though.

I think initially removing the hood clasp is a good idea - however when you get an reasonable first fit - reinstall temporarily and without closing the hood make sure the spring plate aligns exactly centered on the latch plate especially front to back - if this is wrong you may have trouble unlatching the hood and anyway will have to start over to correct later.

Once you get this adjusted just right find some way to gauge the front hood gap so you can keep this constant through other adjustments.

Alan