The Stovebolt Site Forums The Shop Area Paint and Body Shop Body and door aligment

This probably is one of those questions or issues that have been answered in one form or another in previous questions but here it is again. 1949 panel truck model 3100 doing a body off restoration. I am at the point where the body is back on the frame and bolted down with new body mounts or pads. Replaced the lower portions of both sides to the cowling because they were rotted, otherwise little or no other welding repairs on body or frame. Issue, neither of the doors, passenger or drivers align, they are both low and hit the striker plate about 1-2" off from where they should. The overall opening for the drivers door looks a bit small or tight for the door. I replaced the pivot pins in the door hinges, otherwise all else is the same. So how do I align the doors and get them to close accordingly. Thank you in advance for your help, I apprecaite it.

Happy Easter, Christ is Risen!


God bless,

Dave

Maybe I am wasting your time with my limited knowledge, but are the holes that bolt the door to the hinges oblong? Can you back the moutning bolts off a bit and then just lift the door up and hold it up while somone re-tightens the mounting bolts?
-or-...can you shim out the lower moutning bolts on both door hinges to tilt the whole assmebly upwards? Just some ideas. Good luck.

It is possible for the door opening to become too small for the door if work was done that allowed the pillar to move. The first thing to do is to place the door in the opening without the hinges to see if a fit is possible. If all is well, the hinge mounting bolts are used to locate the door within the opening. If the front of the door is in or out relative to the cowl, the hinge straps need to be bent to fix it.

Not sure if this is right or helpful,..but shim the same size all around to get equal spacing,..mark very lightly where ya can on door and non door areas. When you can just see the hinges while someone opens the doors WHILE all lines meet up,...mark the hinge, bolt areas, wherever ya can. This way when you tighten everything for good, as you close the door with the shims gone,...you get equal spacing now when the door is shut. Hope this helps,...if not,...sorry. Cheerz !

Next time you repair cowls do it with the body bolted to the frame and test fit the doors before you finish weld the parts. I screwed all my replacement panels on and test fitted the doors before I ever got near mine with a welder.

Since the hinge pillar determines the alignment of the rear edge of the door it doesn't have to be off very much to have a big effect. You could try shimming but if the door opening isn't right the door is going to require major edge work to get the gap right.

If you're 1/2" low in the back you're in for a lot of reworking.

A quick way to rough in the door location that has worked for me, is to tape sections of wooden paint stirrers on the door frame/opening at key points. Then locate and bolt in the door tight enough to stay in place, but easily loosened when making the final adjustments. If you are lucky, after removing the stirrers, the door is roughly where you want it. At least it is a good start point. It doesn't always work, but when it does it saves a considerable amount of time. Aligning doors from my experience and from what I have read is usually painful and a little bit of an art form.

The door can be tilted up or down in the front to back plane. This allows the back of the door to align better with the cab. This also affects the gap line at the cowl. It is a game of compromise to make it look right and allow the door to operate. If the door opening is a little small, the door can bind pretty easily. This is because the door edges and the door frames are shaped like a wedge. I believe this is a feature to make it difficult for a door to be knocked inward in a collision.

I would be astounded if anything on our trucks was designed with occupant safety in a collision in mind.... but that's just my cynical self talking.

My cynical comment is that nobody was ever killed by an airbag in one of these!

I have learned the hard way that Woody is correct,I should have done this work with cab on frame.
Now to get the door to fit I have cut most of my cowl and floor weld and am trying to get the pillar to move the right direction.

Hello all,
I hope I can get a question in here. I am having trouble getting my door hinge bolts out. I have used a breaker bar but I can not get a good hold. I do not have an impact tool so I have to use human power. The bolts at the bottom of the door are the worst of course. I am thinking about just drilling them out.
Any thoughts?? Thank you!

Jon

in the door itself Jon? lots of penetrating juice and patience, if you bugger that threaded plate in there you'll jump off the bridge ... soak'em as good as you can - tighten with a good tap, loosen, tighten, loosen, soak some more, pete and repeat

also note if you have or get an impact driver [hammer on screwdriver type], you can use sockets on them - 6 point, not 12

Bill

Bill,
The ones I am fighting are the ones that mount the hinge to the cab. One above and one below the hinge. Yup that is what I thought. I very cautious of the threads for the bolts.
Thank you! Jon

those aren't as much of a problem Jon - the impact won't help much cuz the cage doesn't the nut well, but still calls for perserverance and lots of penetrant - if the cage nut breaks on those you can still get in to get a nut started, so they can be broken or cut off, where the ones in the door aren't accessible

Bill

Try heating them up till they are cherry red, just the bolt though. The expansion and contraction may break the bond. Then flood them with Kroil or other good penetrating oil after they cool. Drilling should be your last resort.

You could also try welding a larger nut on to the existing bolt but like the fella said... you gotta' be careful not to bust the cage nut loose.

OK thank you all,
Good thoughts. I will try some of them.
I just dropped off the front fenders, hood, grill and tailgate to the body shop! I cant believe the restoration has begun!
Jon

I started on removing the doors. The passanger side lowest bolt was pretty rusted out. I had access to the nut and had to use channel lockshinge to hold the nut to remove the very bottom bolt. The problem now is on both doors, the very top bolts holding the hings TopNut are spinning. Bill, I know you told me to watch out for this...but the cage nuts were broke already. I am guesing I will have to drill out the holes. It looks like I would have to cut into the cab to get to the nut. Any thoughts? Thanks, Jon

if you can't get a wrench or visegrip on it and tighten the bolt until it breaks, grind the head off the bolt - or if you have a diegrinder, slice the head in the center and break away the halves with a chisel - when replaced on reassembly, use stainless and a touch of NeverSeez and there won't be any problems in the future

Bill

Bill,
Much thanks! Can you paint over stainless or chrome? I would love to use stainless steele bolts and nuts but I am hearing it is difficult to paint them...Jon

I don't bolt things together until everything is painted, I hate painted bolts - I like the ss bolt kit for the cab and front, looks real nice, and OE the bolts weren't painted

but yeah, ss will take paint, just might not stick as long, although I think epoxy primer will fix that

Bill

my 66's previous owner had some repairs done with the doors off and cab sitting on saw horses.all the work had to be redone.when doing patch panels alignment is very important.it is best to do it while on the frame and doors need to be fitted especially on pillar and threshold work.also take it real slow with the welding to keep the work from drawing an warping.good luck