The Stovebolt Site Forums The Shop Area Paint and Body Shop Hood Alignment

I am working on check fitting my hood and find that I need to make some adjustments but how to achieve a reasonable alignment is not going well.

The spring arms are not connected and there is no latch in place. On the driver's side I am missing one link to hood bolt so I have a standard bolt inserted but not tightened, there is space between the link and the bolt because it does not have a sholder or spacer.

I have what I think is a reasonably good alignment along the top of the cowl on both sides and tightened the hinge brackets to the cab to hold that in place. This may need to be adjusted when I get a correct hood mounting bolt (new bolt set on order).

The front edge of the hood on the driver's side aligns pretty well with the edge of the front fender.

The hood is biased toward the driver's side such that it needs to be flexed slightly toward the passenger side to clear the fender.

The front edge of the hood on the passenger side is a good 1/4 to 3/8" forward of the edge of the fender.

The passenger side of the hood has a significant gap to the fender.

I have removed the radiator support mounting bolts to the frame but can not seem to persuade the support toward the driver's side. My impression is that this would improve the side to side alignment by getting the fenders more in line with the hood.

I loosened the front cab to frame mounting bolts but can not pursuade the cab toward the passenger side.

I have removed the outer fender to cowl bolts on the passenger side fender and loosened the inner fender to cab mounting bolts but can not pusuade the passenger side fender to move forward. All of the outer to inner fender mounting bolts and the brace are loose. I believe what ever is needed to move the fender forward to align with the hood is seperate from the side to side alignment issue above.

I previously measured from the hood hinge mounting bolt on the cab to the radiator support and the passenger side was shorter than the driver's side by an amount that is similar to the amount the hood and fender are misaligned. I am pretty sure I need to determine how to move the passenger side inner fender forward about 3/8" but I do not know how or why that should be the case.

I will not be able to get back to this until Monday but would appreciate any suggestions on how best to proceed.

Is it just my imagination, or is the top of the right front fender deformed a little (pushed down)? Or is it that the right side of the hood is deformed a bit inwards (bowed in)? Because your front and rear gaps on the right side are close, and the center of the gap is so wide, it would seem that the problem is either fender or hood (or a little of both) is slightly deformed. Hard to tell looking at the pics.... Pulling the right fender in with the fender stay will not sort that out, as you have discovered. [Edit] after looking at it again- it looks as though the rear edge of the right fender needs to come down a bit. Perhaps after that, you will be able to "roll" the right fender in by tightening the fender stay?

I am no expert- all I know is the struggle that I had aligning mine. I will say this- make sure the cab is sitting on the cab mounts the way you want it (and pedals are not rubbing in the pedal holes). It's no fun aligning the front end only to discover that you will have to rotate the cab one way or the other slightly afterwards to get the pedals to operate correctly!

Do you have the firewall to fender support rods in place and adjusted correctly? Your right hand rod may be too long, pushing the fender assembly to the right.

The firewall to fender support on the right side is loose at the fender end. Is there an assembly dimension for the support rods?

The right side back of the hood sheet metal is flared out somewhat and there is a part that is under the emblem that is bent and disconnected partially from the hood.

The only thing holding the right fender up at this point is the inner fender. I am thinking if I space the right inner fender away from the cab about 1/2" that will move the inner fender forward and down which should help the fender move down at the rear.

Perhaps I can raise the front of the right fender to help close the gap to the hood although that height is controlled by the radiator support. I guess I need to measure the radiator support on both sides to see if it is tilted.

I converted my pedals to be firewall mounted so I will not be fighting pedal to cab hole clearance issues but that doesn't mean my cab is mounted correctly. I need to make some more measurements to determine if the cab is square on the frame. When I was doing the cab repairs I may have unintentionally moved something although the mounting bolts seemed to align between the cab and the frame. Unfortunately a small change at the cab end makes a lot of difference at the front of the hood.

52Carl did a fine tutorial on lining up hood to fenders step-by-step. Use the search feature to locate it. I took the front clip off of my 54 3100 and his process is what I used to align mine.

The AD Front Clip Alignment Procedure to which Jethro refers can be found near the top of the first page of this Paint and Body forum under Tech Tips.
If I were you, I would stop until you can install the proper shoulder bolt for the hinge. If your remaining bolts are showing signs of wear, you'll want replace them as well. There are just too many tails to chase aligning a hood to take a chance on worn hinge bolts.

The number one thing to understand is that the hood adjustment comes first. That procedure has nothing to do with adjusting the fenders.
You set the hood up in perfect alignment with the cowl, and never touch it again. I cannot stress that enough.
You then adjust the fenders until they align with the hood.

The FAM has the dimensions for the firewall to fender support rods. If it's loose, you can pull the fender inward by adjusting the nuts at the fender bracket. There should be a nut on either side. I don't have the FAM available to me right now or I'd give you the dimensions.

Thank you - I understand the hood adjust comes before the fenders but with the hood adjusted (I think) I can not get the passenger side fender to align, just not sure why.

I will review the tutorial and I will be replacing all of the hood mounting bolts, they are on order.

I have the FAM so I will look for the dimensions for the support brackets but I think I have a bigger problem and just can not seem to visualize how it can be resolved.

You will need to loosen many, many, nuts and bolts until everything is wiggly loose to get everything to line up.
Drop me a PM if you get stuck. I should be able to walk you through it.

Might this legacy Tech Tip, Proper Advance Design Hood Alignment, be of help?

"There are approximately 20 bolts (all adjustable!) holding the fenders and hood to the front of an Advance Design truck -- and they all need to be just right or the front sheet metal won't fit together properly and the hood won't function properly. Yikes! How do you sort that out? The good news is that Mac has already figured it out for you and will walk you through... "

Do what Carl says... it works.
My only advice is Do Not slam the hood until the latch mechanism aligns just right.
Been there. Done that. I had to add 1/4" rubber spacers to the radiator support bolts to lift the front up enough so it would latch (and more importantly, so it would UNlatch)

I have been side tracked but plan to follow the process. I know one error I made originally was that the driver's side fender was locked down and I felt good about that because it fit pretty well with the hood. Now I realize that without the driver's side being able to move it was restricting the radiator support movement and ability to align the passenger side.

The biggest question that remains is the fore/aft position of the passenger side fender relative to the hood. I can see how having all of the fender bolts on both sides and the radiator support loose can move the front of the fenders side to side to get the hood to fender gaps. Raising the radiator support would affect the hood to latch relationship. If I can shift the passenger side fender forward enough to align with the hood it will be great but I'm having trouble picturing it.

I hope to be able to get back out to the grage today and see what progress I can make.

ALL STOP!! I feel the need to bang the lectern, stomp my foot, shoot a pistol into the ceiling ... whatever.

Quit chasing your tails for a moment and re-read what Carl posted above.



Having lived this dream on two ADs, I can't stress enough what Carl says. It's a bottom line, end of discussion point. But to back it up, when I restored a '49 4400, I got fixated on the fender support rods and the radiator support ... trying different amount of washers, adjusting the fender supports ... back and forth, over and over. It drove me bat guano crazy and frustrated to the point I'd throw a wrench, turn out the lights, slam the garage door and quit for the day.

Since then, I have had the front clip on and off, and apart, twice now on the '49 1-ton -- including removing the hood both times. Everything went right back together like it came from the factory. In *perfect* alignment. Why? BECAUSE I DIDN'T TOUCH THE HINGES!!!!!!!!!!!!!

As Carl says, they were adjusted *to the cowl* properly at the factory so I didn't need to mess with them. Because of that, everything went back together easy peasy chicken squeezy. Not once, but twice now.

So .... Here it is again:




John

Got it!

Of course my hinges were removed a few years ago when I took everything apart and who knows if they were right before that as nothing was really assembled.

I honestly thought I did have the hood adjusted correctly and the hinges locked down but I am going back to the beginning and starting over at the beginning with the hood adjustment procedure as outlined.

Did you ever get the proper shouldered hinge bolts. I would stop all activity until you do. Once you do, work on getting your hood adjusted like John says. If the hinge to hood bolts aren't correct and locked in, you might be able to perfectly adjust your hood, lean on it, and it will be all out of whack again. Get the proper hardware before you begin anything. The regular bolt in the hinge link may only move an 1/8" at the hood rear corner, but can translate to an inch or more of movement at the hood latch area.

The bolts are on order but I do not have a delivery date yet. I did fashion a spacer to simulate the sholder on the one temporary bolt but have not really tried to move forward until I can get the right bolts and get the hinges adjusted.

My goal at the moment is to get the hinges locked down so that I can take it all apart for paint but not need to address fit issues that can not be adjusted once I get to the final painted assembly process. If I can convince myself that it is just a matter of adjustment on final assembly great. My initial concern was that the passenger side firewall area was not in the correct location given the repairs made in that area of the cab.

I may just take a step back and work on other aspects of the project for a while and when the bolts are available start again.

When I nail down the perfect hood fitment prior to paint, I drill two 1/8" holes through each hinge and the cowl so that I can use a drift pin to install the hinges in exactly the same position after paint.

52Carl, that is a great tip. Hinge location is so critical on these trucks.

Carl, wouldn't you need two holes to keep the hinge from rotating around that single hole? Although that movement would be fairly minimal once a bolt was inserted. Do you also plug the holes after final assembly to keep water out of the cab?

klhansen, Re-read my post. 2 holes each hinge. I use the same non-hardening putty which is called for between the hinges and the cowl. Its light gray in color and blends in with the color of my hinges.

One thing that I beleive is involved but not part of the procedure is setting the height of the radiator support.

While I am waiting for the correct bolts I have been reviewing the procedure and would like to know how to set the radiator support height, either as part of the hood alignment or just generally. I beleive the assembly manual basically says shim it to fit but any additional guidance would be appreciated while I impatiently wait for my new bolts to arrive.

Lay your hood in position. No latch, no hinges, no springs. Set whatever gap you prefer at the top of the cowl, under the windshield. Look at the side of the hood where it goes down to the side of the cowl. If the gap is greater than the gap you set up top, your radiator support needs to go down. If the gap is smaller than the top, The radiator support needs to go up.

MNSmith - thanks for the clarification.

When I remove the hinge and spring parts to install the new bolts I will check it.

Ditto on that Carl as I also did with the door hinges before final strip and paint,it made life so much easier during reassembly.
The other thing I found was the sheer range of adjustment the firewall to radiator core rods allowed when doing the final fender to hood adjustments.
My truck had suffered some front end 'trauma' during its 70+ years.
One by the P.O. and one by me.

jockbolter50, Yep, those threaded rods will work miracles for you once you can wrap your head around what is going on with them as you adjust them.
This task is where it is imperative to have all of the nuts and bolts loose as a goose on a hot day, whereas sauce is shooting out of them like a sick cat.

I am back to this aspect of my project and have attempted to adjust the hood per Carl's procedure. I do have new hood mounting sholder bolts and none of the latch parts are installed. I am not to the fender portion of the procedure yet.

From everything I can tell my hood when aligned with the cab is positioned too far to the driver's side in the front. To align the radiator support with the hood the support would need to be off center compared to other features (support mounting holes, bumper, splash shield, etc.) leading me to believe my cab is not positioned correcty on the frame.

I removed the front cab mounting bolts and loosened the rear cab to mounting bracket bolts but can not seem to change the cab position. I considered removing the rear cab mounting bolts but am concerned that I will loose all location references at that point.

For background the cab was removed from the frame, the front cab mounting areas on both sides (including floor ito firewall areas) were rebuilt and the rear cab mounts were rebuilt with new rubber bushings as part of the build process. When I placed the cab back on the frame there was some tweaking to get bolts to align but nothing that indicated there would be a problem.

Are there dimensions that I can check associated with the position of the cab on the frame? By eye the rear of the cab appears to be parrallel to the frame cross member in that area.

If the problem is not associated with my cab position relative to the frame I think I will need to position the hood hinges such that the passenger side is very tight to the cab while the driver's side will have a significant gap to get the front of the hood centered on the radiator support, if I can even with those gap differences.

Are. Ok,

You will need to ensure that the cab is located square to the frame. I would measure from the mounting hole of the front cab mount to the frame rail on both sides and see if they are equal. If not, you may have to drill your front cab mounting holes oversize to center the front of the cab.
You will likely need to loosen the fender-to-side cowl bolts and remove the inner fender-to-toeboard bolts to be able to move the cab left or right.

Thanks, I will measure the front mounting holes to the frame as suggested.

The fender to toe board bolts are not installed. The fender to cowl bolts are either not installed or only loosely installed depending on which fender/bolt position.

I tried to measure the mounting hole locations relative to the frame but that proved challenging because of all the various pieces and parts in the way. I was able to measure from the frame to the rocker panel as far forward as I could and convinced myself that the cab is in fact square on the frame.

I went back to the beginning of Carl's procedure and making some progress. The hood to cowl fit seems pretty good (I do not have the anti rattle seal installed on the cowl). It seemed that if anything I would have likes to get the passenger side hinge inner bolt to allow the hood to go back more but it would not move any further.

The driver's side fender seems to be in a good place relative to the hood both on the sides and at the front.

The passenger side fender needs to come toward the center of the truck but the inner fender is tight against the radiator support so it can not move in. I could add spacers between the fender and the inner fender, but wonder if others have had to do this? There is also a significant (maybe 3/4") gap between the rear of the passenger side inner fender and the cab toe board. No bolts in place there at this point but it seems like a long way to try and reform the inner fender to bolt in place. I tried using the cab/fender brace rod to pull the fender in but all that seemed to accomplish is pulling the fender backward making the disparity between the front of the hood and front of the fender worse. If I adjust the rod longer it helps push the fender forward but it still is further back than the hood. Perhaps once I resolve the inner fender to radiator support issue it will also change.

I don't know if this has been mentioned up to this point. I didn't find it in the older tech tip. If your hood needs to come backwards (horizontally) toward the cab when you're adjusting it (before you start installing fenders and inner fender pieces and before you install the spring loaded pieces) loosen the 3 bolts (2 inside and 1 outside) move your hinge piece toward the front...meaning away from the cab. I know, it seems the pivot points for the two swinging hinge pieces (not the spring loaded piece) ought to move backward to accomplish this but that hasn't been the case in the many of these I've done. The hinge piece if moved forward will (a) help locate the hood more correctly and (b) will allow the hinge piece to travel down vertically easier. Good luck!

Jon, sorry but I am not following what you are suggesting. I believe there are 2 bolts that mount the hinge brackets to the cab, and two bolts that connect the swinging hinge arms (connected to the hinge brackets) to the hood. Where is the third bolt?

Here is a photo of the three bolts Jon is talking about.

I need to go look, I do not recall there being a bolt on the outside of the hinge bracket. If there is that would explain why I am not getting the movement expected with the other two bolts loose. I have had those brackets off and on multiple times and could easily have forgotten that there is a third bolt.

Thanks Phil,
Yes, those are the 3 bolts. The further back the hinge is pushed (back toward the cab that is), the higher it must sit. So by moving it forward you get better adjustment vertically. Many times I've found this to be the answer when I can't get a hood to pull down at the rear end of it...the edge which runs along the cab and must contact the anti-rattle strip. There is a spot for the hinge to sit which will give the best results and sometimes it is elusive.

Also...I have seen some hoods that no matter what I did adjustment-wise would not fit with a nice gap where the bottom edge of the hood and the body (not the fenders) meet. Usually this occurs on the driver's side and aside from removing some metal I haven't ever been able to sort a solution. If you move the hinge up, you get a better gap, but you usually can't get the hood to pull down to the anti-rattle strip tight enough any longer. If anyone has figured this out, I'd be happy to hear how.

I have confirmed that I indeed have a location for a third bolt from the outside, just no bolt has been installed there. When I purchased the truck it was partially assembled and I suspect the outside bolts were not there and I never questioned it. The lack of a bolt installed is probably not related to my hood alignment but I will need to install them at some point.

Jon, at this point I do not have the anti-rattle strip installed as I was planning to hold that until after paint. My hood seems to lay pretty flat/tight to the top of the cowl which may result in too much contact when the strip is installed later.

I have noticed that regardless of how tight I get the gap at the back of the hood to the cowl that after opening and closing the hood a few times the gap increases. Again, not sure that it relates to my fender fit issue but trying to be as descriptive as possible about my efforts.

In my experience the hood to cowl gap has no relationship to your fenders. However it does seem to me all 3 bolts are needed. There is a lot of force associated with the hood (the weight), the spring bars, etc and hinge pieces have been known to move a bit if everything isn't tight. Have you tried (and you will need a helper) unhooking the spring loaded pieces and setting the hood down? First get the missing bolt you need, install it with a washer and lock washer and then adjust the hinges as needed and tighten all 6 bolts. Then holding the hood up, remove the two spring bars carefully and lower the hood gently. Raise and lower it a few times (it will not be as easy when the spring bars are not connected) and see if the gap increases. If it does, let's see if the pivot spots where the two short bars connect to your hinges are okay.

Two bolts are accessed from the outside, the third from inside under the dash. After raising and lowering your hood, adjusting the gaps, the third one is the last one you tighten from the inside.

WICruiser,
PM me and I will give you my phone number. This process is to complex for me to simply throw ideas at you. hoping it will help.
I have a pretty good idea of what is causing you problems. I phone conversation will be much more productive I believe.
Carl

MNSmith, just to clarify I beleive there are two bolts accessed from inside under the dash (these I have installed) and one from the outside that I do not have installed.

Jon, I have moved the hood up and down with the spring arms disconnected in the process of adjusting the hood to cowl gap per Carl's procedure. I beleive the gap change I mentioned appears when I install the spring arms as they are pushing the hood when the hood is closed. I believe per Carl's procedure the first inside bolt is tightened prior to installing the spring arms and the second inside bolt is tightened after the spring arms are installed and the gap "adjusted". I have not seen much change to the gap when installing the spring arms initially but the gap seems to grow over time (not a lot) so perhaps the installation of the third bolt would help prevent that creep.

Carl, thank you for the offer. I have sent you a PM.