Kind of an odd question, but...hood hinges won't close entirely after sitting open for years.

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ProjectBazza

ProjectBazza

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I'm working on my good friends Australian '71 VG Valiant (think '69 Dart), and now that the engine is back-in and running, I'll be putting the hood back on this weekend. But....

Bazza (Barry), the owner, removed the hood about 2 years ago (when he was still healthy), and when we went to his house and picked-up the car recently, we bolted it back in place for safe transport. We were able to get the hood lined-up quite nicely, and it closes just fine (in the front), but we never got the rear/back part of the hood to "settle-in" and sit even with the cowl. It's almost like the hinges took a "set" while the hood was off and the car was up on blocks/in storage, and they didn't seem to want to close properly, even if we leaned on the back of the hood a little.

I've shot all sorts of luber-slider stuff onto the hinges through the access space where the hinges come up into the engine compartment, in the hopes of loosening things up, but I can't get the hinges to budge "manually", without the hood attached, and I'll admit I'm afraid of using the hood as a leverage tool (don't want to risk getting that square body Chevy bent-hood look).

Any advice? Can I/should I just use the hood, or is there a secret somewhere I don't know about?

Thanks.

Jim
 
Try this, loosen one bolt at a time, have someone lift the hood so the bolt shifts to the edge of it's slot.. Tighten the bolt & move to the next one... Do all four & see if the hood comes down....
 
What I do is loosen all the bolts, then lift the front of the hood till the bolts stop it and tighten them down again.
 
1WildRT said:
Try this, loosen one bolt at a time, have someone lift the hood so the bolt shifts to the edge of it's slot.. Tighten the bolt & move to the next one... Do all four & see if the hood comes down....
Click to expand...
TrailBeast said:
What I do is loosen all the bolts, then lift the front of the hood till the bolts stop it and tighten them down again.
Click to expand...

Thank you, gentlemen! :thumbsup:

If all goes well in the morning (putting the car back on the ground, torquing suspension bolts, etc), I should be doing this right after lunch tomorrow, and I'll try both of these things.
 
The hood springs are in a tight spiral, try getting lubricant on them too, they might have gotten a little rusty and aren’t sliding against their wraps.
 
Mr. Sinister said:
The hood springs are in a tight spiral, try getting lubricant on them too, they might have gotten a little rusty and aren’t sliding against their wraps.
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I've sprayed quite a bit of lubricant down that hole/access space, and I've tried to aim it on the coils as well as the hinge points, but it's dang near impossible to know where it's gone, as that access hole isn't very large.

I guess we'll see....
 
It’s as easy as a minor adjustment on the rear hood to hinge bolt. As mentioned above, loosen the bolts slightly, lift the front of the hood slightly to allow the rear bolt to slide down in the hole and tighten them back up. Do a little at a time, and mark where you started by using a pencil around the washered head of the bolt. Small moves sometimes yield big results, so go little by little.
 
ProjectBazza said:
I've sprayed quite a bit of lubricant down that hole/access space, and I've tried to aim it on the coils as well as the hinge points, but it's dang near impossible to know where it's gone, as that access hole isn't very large.

I guess we'll see....
Click to expand...
Open the door and look into that area.
 
ProjectBazza said:
I'm pretty sure I tried that when we first brought the car to our place, but I've slept since then so I don't recall if there was a way to get lube in there or not.

But I'll try it again this evening when I got home, for sure!
Click to expand...
Good luck!

:thumbsup:
 
cosgig said:
It’s as easy as a minor adjustment on the rear hood to hinge bolt. As mentioned above, loosen the bolts slightly, lift the front of the hood slightly to allow the rear bolt to slide down in the hole and tighten them back up. Do a little at a time, and mark where you started by using a pencil around the washered head of the bolt. Small moves sometimes yield big results, so go little by little.
Click to expand...

Got it!

And thanks!
 
I'm betting on hood alignment.

It is counter intuitive.

Lifting the rear causes it to sit lower.
 
Got it!

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We weren't all that careful about the hood alignment when we picked the car up, as I knew I'd be taking it right back off again in a few hours.

And while I'm pretty sure I could have gotten it on there today...eventually, the tips I got from all y'all helped considerably!

So, thank you, one and all!

Jim
 
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