Spiral Hood Springs

Evidently, you just need to wind the spring. Try a needle nose visegrip, you can hook another visegrip or Cresent wrench for added leverage. Go 1 revolution and try it out8)
How do I wind the spring? The spring is so tight that I can only pull it around maybe 1/3 turn or 1/2 at the most. It took two of us to pull the darn thing around yesterday and after we hooked it up, we had the spring on the wrong way because the tension was super tight when the hood was up, but loose when it was down. If we turn the spring the other way, the hook is either too close and won't provide any tension or well over 1/2 a turn away and requires umpteen million pounds of force to pull it around. Is there a technique or something I'm missing?

Thanks.