Door hinge adjustment
02-16-2021, 04:25 PM
#46
I still have my shims for free, but I have never actually had to put any of them into use, so it may be better for someone else to answer your question Nevertheless I will tell you what I think you need to do. First check the other door to see if it is in need of adjustment. To check for the amount of sag you have in either door you need to open the door just barely past being closed and so it is not dragging on the door sill, then determine just how much sag there actually is. Then let me know just how much you find you need to raise the rear of the door and tell me, and request some shims from me. I'll put together a few of them and put them in the mail. Send me your address with your request. When you get them, open the door and then remove all the bolts holding the hinge to the door post. Then slip a calculated number of shims in between the hinge on the door and the mounting place inside the door post.
The spacing between the top and bottom hinges is about a foot, as I recall, and the distance from the hinges to the rear bottom of the door is about 3 feet, also as I recall. That means that to raise the rear of the door a certain amount you need one third that much in shims to do it. When you tell me how much sag there is I'll figure out how many and what thickness shims to send you.
After you have placed the shims and snugged the hinge bolts and you have determined that the bottom gap is correct you may need to slightly loosen the top hinge bolts and then adjust the top of the door in or out to have the surface true then tighten the bolts. Do you have any tools?
P.S. You bumped this thread, so I assume you have read it.
The spacing between the top and bottom hinges is about a foot, as I recall, and the distance from the hinges to the rear bottom of the door is about 3 feet, also as I recall. That means that to raise the rear of the door a certain amount you need one third that much in shims to do it. When you tell me how much sag there is I'll figure out how many and what thickness shims to send you.
After you have placed the shims and snugged the hinge bolts and you have determined that the bottom gap is correct you may need to slightly loosen the top hinge bolts and then adjust the top of the door in or out to have the surface true then tighten the bolts. Do you have any tools?
P.S. You bumped this thread, so I assume you have read it.
02-17-2021, 09:31 AM
#47
Rennlist Member
Where did I say "buckling?"
It looks to me like you do not actually "see" any of this because you have not even gone out and opened the car door to look at the situation. When you do you will find that the hinges are not on the rear side (rear meaning the rear of the car) of the door post as you might expect, but rather in a pocket on the front side of the back of the post. You cannot shim the hinges to the rear, but only forward. That is why you need shims for the top hinge. Go look at it. Then follow the instructions I have already written. I don't know how else to tell you how to proceed except to hire someone who can do it for you
It looks to me like you do not actually "see" any of this because you have not even gone out and opened the car door to look at the situation. When you do you will find that the hinges are not on the rear side (rear meaning the rear of the car) of the door post as you might expect, but rather in a pocket on the front side of the back of the post. You cannot shim the hinges to the rear, but only forward. That is why you need shims for the top hinge. Go look at it. Then follow the instructions I have already written. I don't know how else to tell you how to proceed except to hire someone who can do it for you
Last edited by Jerry Feather; 02-17-2021 at 02:07 PM.
02-17-2021, 01:46 PM
#49
Rennlist Member
One picture shows the door closed and the bottom of the door appears to be touching the door sill. The other photo shows the door slightly open, but one cannot tell where the two surfaces in question are in respect to each other.
As to the front gap I suggest that you take your dial or digital caliper and measure the gap both at the top and at the bottom and publish what the exact measurements are. I think they are going to be different by several thousandths, although they may appear to you as "well adjusted."
Edit: In fact I can tell from your previous pictures, and with my micrometer eye, that the front gap is different from top to bottom by about 40 to 50 thousandths.
As to the front gap I suggest that you take your dial or digital caliper and measure the gap both at the top and at the bottom and publish what the exact measurements are. I think they are going to be different by several thousandths, although they may appear to you as "well adjusted."
Edit: In fact I can tell from your previous pictures, and with my micrometer eye, that the front gap is different from top to bottom by about 40 to 50 thousandths.
Last edited by Jerry Feather; 02-17-2021 at 01:49 PM.
02-17-2021, 01:57 PM
#50
Rennlist Member
I think you should be looking at or for a 3/16 inch gap and that is 0.1875 inches. The factor that I published before is not 3 to 1 but rather 3.5 to one. If you use that factor and the door is just touching the sill you need a 50 thousandths shim or a combination that totals close to that, between the top hinge and the door post where the top hinge mounts. Again, you cannot shim the hinges back but only forward. If the sill is actually lifting the door a little bit you need more. In other words, when you close the door fully is the sill lifting the door a tiny bit or not. You need to determine that.
02-17-2021, 03:45 PM
#51
Ok, thank you very much Jerry, I will make the measurements you tell me and I will publish them with photos, 50 thousandths would be approximately 1 mm? Another question I have is whether it is necessary to remove the door to install the wedges?
02-17-2021, 04:54 PM
#52
Rennlist Member
1mm is about .040 inch. .063 is about a sixteenth of an inch. .050 is just about in the middle between them. Please read the detailed instructions I first posted for you about how to install the shims. That should answer your question about the door. What I provide are shims, not wedges.
02-18-2021, 11:28 AM
#54
Another thing I have observed is the difference between the bevel of the moldings on both sides and the close proximity to the fender on the left side
Last edited by javiherdepa; 02-18-2021 at 11:40 AM.
02-18-2021, 12:38 PM
#55
Rennlist Member
I would not be too concerned about the slight difference in the position of the rub strips. The bevels are correct so far as I can tell.
The front gap appears even and correct; so I guess I need my micrometer eye calibrated.
One thing I suspect is that since it appears that your car is repainted, this may not be the original door. What do you know about the damage history of this car?
The front gap appears even and correct; so I guess I need my micrometer eye calibrated.
One thing I suspect is that since it appears that your car is repainted, this may not be the original door. What do you know about the damage history of this car?
02-18-2021, 01:17 PM
#56
Well, unfortunately I don't have the car's history and, if you're right, the car was repainted three times, 🤬, so perfectly the door might not be the original, if so, wouldn't it be possible to adjust it? The one on the other side is perfect.
Last edited by javiherdepa; 02-18-2021 at 01:19 PM.
02-18-2021, 04:16 PM
#57
Rennlist Member
The reason there are no shims in or even available for the door hinges, other than from me, is that the car is to some extent built around the doors. By that I mean that the hinges are jig welded onto the doors then the doors are placed in the body jig and some or many of the other body pieces are welded in around them. Then the doors are removed and the body painted; so the doors will fit the same when the car is ready for final assembly. Nobody is going to spend a day or any part of a day trying to get the doors to fit.
What I think that means is that a replacement door from another 928 that has probably been wrecked or otherwise parted out is not going to fit as well as the original door. So if a car is smacked on one side in or around the door, requiring replacement of the door, there is a potential problem. In this case that can explain why a door has a perfect gap at its front edge but the door is sagging onto the sill at the rear. I think the solution to this is to shim the door up off of the sill and live with a less than perfect gap at the front and maybe elsewhere.
It could also be that the car was smacked hard enough to throw the door opening off just a little so that the current situation exists. How to deal with it is still to lift the rear of the door and live with less than perfect gaps elsewhere, and maybe even at the bottom, since one may not want to lift the rear all the way, but just enough to average out all the gaps and still not drag on the sill.
What I think that means is that a replacement door from another 928 that has probably been wrecked or otherwise parted out is not going to fit as well as the original door. So if a car is smacked on one side in or around the door, requiring replacement of the door, there is a potential problem. In this case that can explain why a door has a perfect gap at its front edge but the door is sagging onto the sill at the rear. I think the solution to this is to shim the door up off of the sill and live with a less than perfect gap at the front and maybe elsewhere.
It could also be that the car was smacked hard enough to throw the door opening off just a little so that the current situation exists. How to deal with it is still to lift the rear of the door and live with less than perfect gaps elsewhere, and maybe even at the bottom, since one may not want to lift the rear all the way, but just enough to average out all the gaps and still not drag on the sill.
Last edited by Jerry Feather; 02-18-2021 at 04:19 PM.
02-19-2021, 10:07 AM
#59
Rennlist Member