any suggestions on how to better fit the hood? As you can see, the hood on the right side of the car just about falls through into the engine compartment. The left side is not much better. The fire wall brackets cannot be changed so the hood former cannot be repositioned. The radiator can only go back so far. Tank you in advance for your help. Bob
here is the right side. The worse side.
It looks to me as you have the hood on backwards! Bud.
Maybe the hood former is a tad to low? It should be 3/4 inch off the frame.
Jack and his 'My best friend in London right now, Janet Cole' have it right, the hood former needs to move up to reposition that hood.
Carefully adding more bend at the curved area of the hood will flatten it to follow the rads angle more closely and will kick out the sharply angled ends a bit too. Should fit a lot better. beats moving the former any way.
Robert, I have found that fitting the former directly in the centre and at the recommended height is not always the way to get the best fit. Rather, I jiggle the former against the firewall until the hood has the best fit at the radiator. once this is achieved, then the former can be screwed in place. It is very difficult to pick any difference from each side to tell whether the former is off centre, so if the fit is good at the radiator, you have the best compromise.
Hope this helps.
Allan from down under.
Bob,
Looking at your 1st pic, look at the distance from the hinge to the bend at the front, then same distance at the rear. Could the hood possibly be on backward as Bud suggested? If it's correct then Allen's solution should fix it. Root of the problem is probably what appears to be a Phillips head screw holding the former to the firewall!