The Stovebolt Site Forums The Shop Area Paint and Body Shop Hood To Cowl Seal

This minor–-
I plan to install the hood to cowl seal on my ’54 3100 tomorrow. The kit came with 8 fasteners. The video I watched showed 8 fasteners , each being placed at a receiving indentation. On my truck there are 4 indentations per side , but the lowest/outboard one has no screw hole. Same on both sides.
It will be a simple task to drill that , but I am wondering if this is a common situation, or is mine an oddball?

I think you're just an oddball.

My cab has all 8 holes drilled. From your picture, the bottom hole just isn't there, and not plugged with something, unless someone was sneaky and welded both of them shut. I wonder how the lowest edge of the hood seal was held on, or was it just flapping in the breeze?

Here is a picture of mine installed. There are two more near the cowl vent not shown in the picture.

Phak-
You have a total of 8?

Khanson , there was no seal when I acquired the truck , other than some hardware store stick-on junk.

Yes, there is a total of eight.

Well , this shall remain a minor mystery.
Tomorrow I drill. Figured I should take care of that missing seal before I re-mount the hood - and find out if my reshaping of that hood was successful.

Reach under the dash and feel around where that hole is supposed to be. It someone filled it in the past, you should feel something there.

I'm wondering if that was an aftermarket cab. Could be they didn't install the hood seal. I'd be surprised if a factory cab made it 70 years without those holes.
It's really a moot point now. Drill the holes.

Mine has 8 also...image might be upside down.

I am quite sure that the cab is original.
Holes drilled, seal installation went great.
STILL struggling to improve the fit of the blankety-blank hood though.

Look at the Tech Tip AD Front Clip Alignment Procedure. This may help with your hood.

Nearly all of the information in the AD Front Clip Alignment Procedure tip was gleaned from the 1948-1951 Chevrolet Truck Shop Manual.
That information was rearranged in such a manor to improve the flow of the procedure so that you don't need to hop around the Shop Manual to stay on point, and some of the language was changed and written in such a way that regular folks can comprehend it.
I cannot express enough, the importance of completely separating the tasks of aligning the hood from the task of aligning the rest of the front clip. The hood comes first. Once it is aligned, you don't change it. Any further adjustments to line everything else up involves aligning the fenders to the already properly aligned hood.

I did read the tech tip. I thought it held the key to solving my problem, which is:
The lower trailing edges (sides) of the hood were hugging the truck, while the upper edge was high in relationship to the cowl , all across the hood.
I loosened the center bridge piece and added washers/shims between the outboard ends and the frame members as instructed. The result was , center of hood came down while the mid point flanks were still quite high. The sides no longer hugged the cab. I then loosened that centerpiece again, reducing washers from 4 to 3. Slight improvement , but still not a good fit relative to the cowl.
I will make another incremental adjustment in my next garage session, but my hope of getting a good fit is not strong.

I am working with the original cab , and a 1954 hood that is not original to the truck. Did Chevrolet fit hoods individually back then? Do hoods vary from truck to truck?

From your description of the issue, I'm thinking that the hood may have had some tweaking when it was off the original truck. Maybe it wasn't stored correctly and got smooshed (highly technical P&B term ) a bit so that the sides are wider than they should be. Some judicious unsmooshing may be in order. With the cross support at the rear being fairly stout, it might be tough to do. Maybe a ratchet strap between the hood hinge mounting points, pulling them together?
Good luck

Waveski - the hoods for the 1954-55 1st Series Truck are different than the 1947-53 Hoods. The left/right hood section part numbers for the 47-53 are 3682615 / 2616. The 54-55 1st are 3701466 / 1467. I cannot tell you what the difference is but I seem to recall Denny Graham discussing this issue at one point. I've attached two photos that Denny had in his database. I'm fairly certain he won't mind if I share them with you.

Ron, I'm guessing that the only difference might be the front emblem mounting holes, which would require a different part number, but can't say for sure if the rear edge at the cowl would be different, as the cowl parts on the cab appear to be identical from 47-55.1, although on the 54 the cowl vent is slightly different shaped.

Maybe I'll try and hunt down Denny Graham's post about this. Standby.

[on edit]Here's one by Denny agreeing that the difference is in the front emblem mounting holes. Link

Here's some info from Carl52 on the subject found while searching. Link And another opinion from the same thread as Carl's. Link

Kevin, like I said, I don't know the differences but what you've said and linked would suggest the emblem holes for the front and side are the differences.

I thought there was the possibility the hood was a "no-fit" issue but glad we got that straightened out. Hopefull there's some value in knowing the hood should fit regardless of year just in case its non-original to that truck.

Sorry Waveski, hope I didn't cause you any stress in my lame attempt to help.

It's all good, Ron. Made me dig into it.

Hopefully Waveski can get his hood to fit. As the saying here in P&B goes, "It's just metal" But attempts to fix things can go bad. Take it slow and easy.

To clarify-
Hood was not “smooshed” , smooshed being low and wide.
My issue was the opposite- hood was high and narrow , so to speak.
My truck is ‘54 with original cab , hood is ‘54 from different truck.

Attached is a recent photo showing’54 truck and hood .

LOL
Smooshed could be in more than one direction. Then maybe you need to put some blocks between the hood hinges and spread it a bit. But you said when you brought the center down, the edges of the hood stuck out. Sounds like the corners above each side have the wrong curvature to match the cowl.

Just trying to understand how you might get it to fit correctly.

Me too …

Hoods used to get "smooshed" by riding down hills in the snow back when kids still went outside.