Pax door and hood alignment issue

[bil1024]

So having two issues here, the passenger door at the rear of the door does not line up at top and rear 127780127781

as far as the hood the passenger side lines up perfect, the driver side is a good quarter inch off 127782


any suggestions before I contact FFR

[edwardb]

Not sure what to tell you. Or what you expect Factory Five to say. Everything fits eventually but it's not easy and takes a lot of adjusting to find the optimal locations for everything. I found the instructions were spot on for the rear body mount, e.g. dimensions provided, how to center, etc. After that, I pushed and pulled for two weeks. Everything interacts, so you shouldn't finalize anything until you're happy with it. That includes the nose hinges and the door hinges. Getting the nose to fit affects the body. Closing and latching the hood affects the door fit. Etc. I had some challenges with mine, but not in the areas you mentioned.

[Alphamacaroon]

A few thoughts...

Passenger Door:
Hard to tell from the picture, but the bottom doesn't look all that bad to me. You should align the top of the flare on the body and the door as closely as possible— see the green line in the picture below. Then you will trim off the excess bottom part of the door— the blue part in the picture below— to match the contour of the body behind it.

127788

Also, it's hard to tell how badly the top is misaligned from that picture, but it doesn't look horrible (would need a side-view to see it better). All things being equal, you should probably align the top of the door first, and then rebuild or reshape the bottom to fit. It's better to add filler or fiberglass to the bottom to make it fit right, than it is to shave down the top the of door and risk weakening it.

To be honest, my passenger door did not fit as well as the drivers side as well, so it's possible there might be a small misalignment issue with newer bodies. But even with the alignment issues, it still seems fixable to me.

Hood:

Really hard to say here, other than I found the hood to be a real ***** to get right. You're just going to have to play with it. The real key to getting the hood to sit right is to align the back arch of front wheel well with the front of the pontoon. You should be able to rest the hood on the front of the car, align both rear ends of the wheel wells and have it sit pretty well. If it doesn't sit well then you might need to reposition the whole body. Once it sits well, then you can drill and attach the front hood mounts (i.e. get the hood sitting nicely on the body first, then let that determine where and how to drill and adjust the front mounts).

Also, some of those gaps won't look perfect until you latch the hood down— the downward force on the hood will tend to "form" the hood around the front lip of the body to some extent. The hood locator pins and plates also help to help the hood into the proper position.

[Erik W. Treves]

Loosen the body from the frame.... remove everything you have screwed into the frame that goes through the body - including the rear supports... make sure the hood is also raised yup... pull the doors....

1. Pax side - shove the body as far forward as it will go and down against the door sill bar.... the body on the pax side door frame should touch the vertical and horizontal bar at the same time.

2. Still on the pax side.. from the quarter window... shove the body again like you are trying to rotate the body along the long axis

3. put one screw on that side.

4. move to the driver's side - slide the door opening back so it's about 1/2 from the front vertical bar and then raise the body about 3/8 of an inch in that front corner.... I used a long shim for this.

now you should be able to go back and rest everything... the hood should fit better and more centered... it takes a bit to get the whole thing to line up for sure... but I have done 2 this way and it seemed to work each time. You should need to trim the front and bottom of the doors to fit in the hole... as stated above .

[edwardb]

Loosen the body from the frame.... remove everything you have screwed into the frame that goes through the body - including the rear supports... make sure the hood is also raised yup... pull the doors....

1. Pax side - shove the body as far forward as it will go and down against the door sill bar.... the body on the pax side door frame should touch the vertical and horizontal bar at the same time.

2. Still on the pax side.. from the quarter window... shove the body again like you are trying to rotate the body along the long axis

3. put one screw on that side.

4. move to the driver's side - slide the door opening back so it's about 1/2 from the front vertical bar and then raise the body about 3/8 of an inch in that front corner.... I used a long shim for this.

now you should be able to go back and rest everything... the hood should fit better and more centered... it takes a bit to get the whole thing to line up for sure... but I have done 2 this way and it seemed to work each time. You should need to trim the front and bottom of the doors to fit in the hole... as stated above.

Great suggestions Erik. Where were you about a year ago?? I'll try some of that if I ever do it again. Confirms exactly what I found (as have others) that the whole body and nose favor the passenger side and you need to get it pushed over as much as you can for the best fit. Even then, my overhang on the passenger side front tire is slightly more than the driver's side. Can move it any more than I did because then the flange pieces on the underside of the hood hit the frame. Not noticeable but I know it's there. Ultimately it becomes getting it the best you can.

[Alphamacaroon]

Yeah really, where were you? :D Can we pin this thread? Seems like all of the “problem” places on mine probably would have been fixed following this procedure, especially the drivers side door ones. I didn’t even think to put a shim there— just muscled and tweaked everything for hours to get it close enough. This would also help with my side pipe alignment issues....

[John Dol]

Not sure how relevant this is to the Gen III but I'll put it out there for good measure.
We made the door skin fit the opening before installing any of the door frames and hinges. Make sure it fits in the opening properly with nice gaps. Then remove the door skin, install the hardware and match the door to the hardware the same as you had it in the opening without it. Clamp the door to the frame and secure to it.

HTH,

John

PS older versions where more of a nightmare with the doors if you can believe that!

[bil1024]

Loosen the body from the frame.... remove everything you have screwed into the frame that goes through the body - including the rear supports... make sure the hood is also raised yup... pull the doors....

1. Pax side - shove the body as far forward as it will go and down against the door sill bar.... the body on the pax side door frame should touch the vertical and horizontal bar at the same time.

2. Still on the pax side.. from the quarter window... shove the body again like you are trying to rotate the body along the long axis

3. put one screw on that side.

4. move to the driver's side - slide the door opening back so it's about 1/2 from the front vertical bar and then raise the body about 3/8 of an inch in that front corner.... I used a long shim for this.

now you should be able to go back and rest everything... the hood should fit better and more centered... it takes a bit to get the whole thing to line up for sure... but I have done 2 this way and it seemed to work each time. You should need to trim the front and bottom of the doors to fit in the hole... as stated above .

Thanks Erik will try this wknd and let you all knowhow it turned out

[Erik W. Treves]

Well it's in my build thread ;) I was the Beta car after all....lol....but that was 3 years ago now....lol... that went fast.... I am due for another build ....hmmm....

All kidding aside... see my build thread post #178

[Alphamacaroon]

Was looking at this a bit more today— my body is perfectly aligned side-to-side with the front rollbar so I think adding a shim would make the body look a bit crooked when looking at it from the front. Is this noticeable? Maybe the it's hard to see the rollbar through the front window? I might just have to give it a try and see how it looks.

[jdavis500]

In the end, my hood alignment was not as good as I had hoped. As a result, I filled, shaped, and repeated for weeks to basically spread the "error" across several feet of the car so it was less noticeable. If you look at the rear edge of coupe hoods, you will see that they are all different thicknesses because of all the filler that may be needed to level things out. Not sure if you have your struts installed or not. They will definitely change the fitment. I installed nose braces to stiffen up the front of the hood so it wouldn't deform from the pressure of the struts when the hood is closed.

[bil1024]

Update: so tried Eriks tip and sure enough the hood and body lined right up! Thanks all for your advice

[Erik W. Treves]

hey! well check that out :) Glad that worked out for you .... one step closer!!