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Post by john442 on Nov 30, 2019 14:44:31 GMT -5
When I bought my car I noticed the hood and fenders needed better adjustments. The rear of the hood sits up about 1/4" to 1/2" and the fenders both have some bow out by the door about the same 1/4" or more. The hood spacing along the pass fender also is too wide. I have shims and figured I would loosen the fenders up and try to align better before tightening. Same with the hood. Any tips on how to do this would be appreciated. BTW, the hood hinges I have may not be correct. The hood opens and closes ok but it doesn't open as far as my friends 65 442 and when closed it I have to press down on the back corners to make the hood sit down farther. I compared pics of my hinges and my friends and there seems to be slight difference in how the upright arms were mfg. I'm looking to replace these hinges and springs if anyone has them I would be interested in buying them.
Thanks for your help, John
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Post by island65cruiser on Dec 1, 2019 11:52:30 GMT -5
John,I am a retired body shop owner. Maybe I can help. First, verify that your hinges are correct. Make sure your rubber body mount cushions to the frame have not broken down over time. Replace if needed. Good start. Next, verify that your frame is straight. Get the measurements from a manual, and cross measure the points to be sure the frame isn't bent or twisted. If you can't get the measurements, pick equal points on both sides of the frame, like matching bolt holes, to use for measurement points. Next, with the hood off, loosen all fender bolts and align the 90 degree corner of the fender to the cowl vent panel and windshield valance, on each side. Shim to get perfect height and align for about 3/16 space between panels. Snug up the closest bolt to keep the alignment. Then cross measure from rear on right to front on left fender and repeat in the other direction, making an "X" across the nose. If square it will be equal. Move the fronts of the fenders to square the nose. There should be adjustment on the core support, and from the core support to the frame. If you think you have to slot a bolt hole to make it line up, something is bent. Find out what it is before you proceed. Measure across the back and front for width, and compare to the hood. You should have equal spacing on both sides. Then look at door gaps. If they are not equal, and parallel, shim the front of the fender for height to achieve parallel door gap, and tighten bolts. Re-check all previous measurements to see that nothing has changed. At this point if your doors gaps are equal and parallel, but the fenders are out further than the doors, you may need shims between the bottom bolt and the cowl to pull the bow out of the fenders. However, if they stick out from the doors, and the curve of the body lines is exactly the same, you may need to move the hinges out. But, if you have to do that and your weatherstrips are old, you will get wind noise. You may have to live with the fender to door surface misalignment. Remember, these bodies were not built to the tolerances of today's cars. When you are ready to put the hood on, put a couple of layers of masking tape on the fender edges so you don't scrape the paint, and close to hood very gently to check alignment. Some people remove the hood striker when doing this so the hood won't latch while adjusting. Remember, when you do this, the body lines have to match. If they don't, on an old car, it is very likely that he body mounts have sagged and need to be replaced. All this is better done as a two man job, if you have help available. Good luck. PM if you want my phone number if you get stuck. Chris.
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Post by john442 on Dec 2, 2019 11:28:09 GMT -5
Chris,
Thanks for all the good info. I will start with changing the hood hinges first and then loosen the fenders with the hood off. My son is in autobody and thinks my frame flexes too much when the car in on then lift. That will have to be looked into as well. This car was a frame off restoration but there are things like fender and hood alignment that were not done properly. I've fixed most of the things mechanical and electrical that the previous owner did not. If I run into problems or have questions I will contact you. Thanks for all your help. How are you doing with your car. If I remenber weren't you converting to 4 speed?
John
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Post by oldstata on Dec 2, 2019 22:32:45 GMT -5
I just completed this same task on my 65 all good points above Only thing I would like to add, is if this was a frame off restoration. You may need to get it square by loosening the front radiator support mounts and moving it it to center it.
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Post by island65cruiser on Dec 3, 2019 9:22:36 GMT -5
My 4 speed swap is stalled, we are building a new house, and I have had to empty my home garage workshop to clean paint and make stuff attractive to buyers. My lifts,heavy tools and parts are all in a warehouse right now. Thanks for asking.
You didn't say if your car was ever in a crash. If you have access to a body shop that has frame measuring equipment,it might pay for you to have it "set up and measured". I have seen many amateur repairs over the years where owners overlooked that, and sheet metal never lines up on a tweaked frame. When I got out of the business, we got 2.5 labor hours to do that, might be worth it. Regarding frame flex, by today's standards, these frames are junk. If your son was trained on modern unibody cars, the amount of flex in our cars would seem high. I would visually inspect for rust through, or thin metal where rust may have been ground away during a restoration, but if you don't find that, I wouldn't worry.
Oldsdata is right, the core support should be centered in a perfect world, but if your front frame is a little bit off, to line up the sheet metal to the body you may have to move it slightly off center to make that happen. If you measure the frame and it is straight, the body and frame should align together. On today's unibody cars, a variance of 3 millimeters (the thickness of a dime) on frame measure is considered out of spec. We had nowhere near those tolerances in the old days when our cars were built, That's why the pro builders use computer designed and measured frames from Roadster Shop, and others on their big dollar builds, because their hot rod buyers want the fit and finish of a new Mercedes on a muscle car.
In the end, I say get it as close as you can and drive it! My 442 is a "10 footer", and it is 100% original, virgin car bought from an original owner. Get closer than 10 feet, and it is full of flaws.
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Post by john442 on Dec 3, 2019 15:20:28 GMT -5
Thanks oldstata and island65cruiser for the great info and advice I will use it. My son has worked on a few older cars but is much more familiar with the newer cars. As far as frame flexing goes I recall many older cars on a lift would flex even to the point of having trouble when open and closing a door. Some times while the car was on the frame lift we would have to go inside the car for something and that is when we noticed the problem.
i will also replace the hood hinges first.
Thanks again,
John
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Post by stan65cutlass on Dec 3, 2019 23:12:22 GMT -5
too bad your not closer john, i must have 6 sets of hood hinges here, hate to send this stuff to scrap but what am i gonna do with em ?
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Post by island65cruiser on Dec 3, 2019 23:51:03 GMT -5
Please post your surplus parts on the For Sale blog, never know who needs them and will pay for shipping.
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Post by stan65cutlass on Dec 4, 2019 0:22:01 GMT -5
thats true i guess, i got a pile, lots of smalls too, remote mirror ill never use, and many more, when HonestDave passed away his widow gave me a bunch that he had stored at his cabin over here. He would like it to get used by his kinda guys so when i got a minute ill start posting it
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Post by looney1 on Dec 4, 2019 14:12:33 GMT -5
As far as alignment tolerances go, the assembly manual shows plus or minus 3/16 on everything for 1965. That's a lot by today's standards
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Post by fromthegrave65 on Dec 4, 2019 18:03:53 GMT -5
Ony advice I have is to start spraying those cagenuts now. I spun 3 of the 4 fender to cowl bolts. That was after spraying for a couple days before. Didn't take much pressure. Haven't got around to cutting them out and replacing yet. Needed a break.
Moral of story.....don't be like me.
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Post by RAM Z on Dec 5, 2019 10:22:28 GMT -5
I paid my buddy to come over and align everything on mine. Id check the door to quarter gaps first then move forward. Its a pain in the ass aligning sheet metal. It moves in directions you don't think it will.
Also loosen up the front bumper, once you start moving the core support the bumper will need to move with it.
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Post by island65cruiser on Dec 5, 2019 13:58:38 GMT -5
Jasen, Absolutely right to do door to quarter first, and preferably new weatherstrip around the door. From years of experience I will tell you that when you start moving stuff, you open Pandora's box. The two things on our cars that don't move out of alignment should be the "B" pillar, and the cowl. If either of those have been previously crashed and moved, you have to just wing it.The biggest issue on old cars is rusted bolts like fromthegraves65 said. If the stuff moves easy, be sure to use anti-seize when when it goes back together.
The other big thing is do you align to the frame, or the body? Ideally, the body is perfect on the frame, but that won't be most of the time. Mounts sag, floors sag, old cars are like old people. Get too crazy and you are into a "frame off" that you didn't want to do. If the car isn't at least a seven out 10, I would align to the body. If the finished product is a half inch off the center on the frame, no one will notice. Frankly, I'm too old to have the patience to do a "RamZ" quality build on a car today.
I absolutely dread having to take any body panels of my car, but I will need to do pull the front clip in the near future and pray I will be able to pull it in one piece!
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Post by RAM Z on Dec 5, 2019 17:47:06 GMT -5
Most hoods sit up too high on the passenger rear. You can put a shim between the hinge and the hood to lower it, yes lower it, or slot out the hinges so the hinge sits lower at the fender. To fix the fender to hood gap, open the hood and give it a slight shove to the gap you want to close. I saw my body guy do just this, I cringed but it worked.
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Post by bubbasz1 on Dec 6, 2019 7:29:28 GMT -5
When I purchased my post the fit of the doors and fenders sucked. I took everything off, hood, fenders, bumper and started with the doors and worked myself forward. Shims washers whatever it took I did to get it to how I wanted it. Came out quite nice, took about 4 days of messing around but I got it. Couple of years later I was underneath the car and noticed that when they put the body back on the frame they had body mounts in improper places. Haven't brought myself to fixing that yet, gaps on the car still look great, who knows, maybe it will be like that forever, that's the nice part of having a stiff ass post car. Anyways morel of the story is as told earlier is start from the frame up.
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Post by john442 on Dec 6, 2019 13:46:11 GMT -5
To all that responded and gave suggestions and great advice, thank you I will use it. I've been hesitant to get into adjusting the hood and fenders but after fixing all the electrical and mechanical things it is time to do this. In addition I want to replace the lower door hinges because the 2 position rod and spring was removed by the previous owner for some reason. If I'm gonna fix fender and hood adjustment I might as well replace the door hinges at the same time. To do this I'll have a seasoned body guy along with my son and myself doing the work.
I'll let you all know how we do. Thanks again for your great info and suggestions.
John
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Post by island65cruiser on Dec 6, 2019 14:55:08 GMT -5
Jasen, Old body man bag of tricks includes adjustment by quick shove, 2 x 4 in the door jamb, floor jack under the door edge, arm through the window frame to twist doors on post cars, inflating inner tubes behind pop dents and so forth. However, just as a layman shouldn't do Chiropractic adjustments, I am hesitant to recommend the time honored tricks of the trade to the amateur, and be emotionally responsible for their damage.
Bubba, don't be tempted, you know that if you fix those body mounts now, you have to re-do all the other adjustments.
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Post by john442 on Dec 7, 2019 12:24:56 GMT -5
I'm certainly not a body guy but I do know when to call in experts to do the job instead of tackling it myself. As far as bodywork goes, I have a son whose an autobody manager and knows who the good techs are especially for older cars. He has also worked on older cars but is more familiar with the newer ones.
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Post by island65cruiser on Dec 9, 2019 9:53:30 GMT -5
John, sounds to me like you'll have no problem with your project, other than the cost of beer and pizza for the crew. I'm moving to Mt. Dora in March. Close enough that we should be able to meet somewhere in the middle and scope out each other's cars. I'll look forward to meeting you.
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Post by john442 on Dec 9, 2019 13:01:34 GMT -5
Chris looking forward to meeting you and checking out your car too. Since you are moving to central Fl I think you might enjoy going to the Garlits Museum, the Daytona Races, the Turkey Run and the Gator Nationals. The Turkey Run claims to have about 6,000-7,000 cars on show and in the car coral as well as having a large swap meet area.
John
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