The Stovebolt Site Forums The Shop Area Paint and Body Shop Doors align '37 doors

i would like to align the drivers door on my '37 truck. it is about 1/2" low at the back. the passenger door is aligned perfect. i see no way to adjust the hinges to get it aligned. someone told me i need to add, remove shims between the cab and frame to get it the door to move up and down.. is this right? wouldn't this then make the opposite side be off? any help would be appreciated!!! jim

Jim, I'm going to take a guess at this and say that your 37 is like my 46 in that there are no adjustments in the hinges.

With the 41-46 trucks you have to actually tweek/bend the hinges. This sounds worse than it really is. It involves putting a block of wood in the hinge and closing the door on it to tweek the hinge and move the door the direction you neeed.

If you want to try this, email me directly and I can send you scans of the procedure from the GMC truck service manual. I think it should work for your 37.

George
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I don't have any answers but I do want to say I thought I would NEVER get my 37 doors to even shut decent. The body man worked and worked on them and they are "sort of" decent but have much to be desired. With the door stops missing the only things that stopped the doors were the fenders and the hinges took a beating.
I'm interest in what you do or how you make out. Good luck.

wow!! a 2x4 and a floor jack huh! will try that if the wooden blocks advice from the '46 manual does not work that george posted. i've done similar with a porta power at work building fan guards for cat, deere ect. sometimes they close up after welding, and they need a push to spread back out.

i think someone could totaly rebuild/restore any pre '73 chevy truck they own, just from info on this web site alone! there is almost anything you'd want to know posted...or just ask and ye shall receive!! and i will probably for sure be asking! thanks for the help guys.

and thanks to stovebolt for the site! it's great. jim

Make sure the hinge pins aren't worn out before trying to tweak the hinges- it could just be that your door is sagging because the hinge pin is worn.

that...i have checked. and they are good. thanks!

Not sure about the floor jack idea being good in all cases.

If the door is low in the back and you have a good, even gap along the leading edge, jacking up the back of the door is going to tighten the leading edge gap at the top. True, you could cut the leading edge of the door to even out the gap but that's something I would avoid. Seems to me that method changes the hinge geometry.

The trailing end of my driver door was low by about 3/4 inch but I had a good gap on the leading edge so I pulled the hinge pillar forward at the top hinge and everything fell into place because the opening was out of whack.
HERE'S a picture of my Rube Goldberg come-along. Of course, I had the advantage of no cowls or floorpan to fight with.

Your bodyman friend has trained eyes and knew what to do in your specific case and although it worked then, it may not be what you need.

Study your situation carefully before proceeding. I don't cut or bend anything until after I have completely mulled it over in my head a hundred times considering all the possible repercussions, and even then things seldom go according to plan. But it does reduce the possible things that could go wrong.

Is the cab on the frame? Check the body mounts, there are wood blocks under there that can go bad and let half the cab sag.
Two at the rear, two in the middle, and two small wood blocks holding the floor to the front half of the cab right at the front lower corner of the door openings. If all these blocks are good and the frame is setting level, then go for the floor jack and 2x4. Joe