Crooked Hood

[DJ S]

While working on my grandfather's tudor, we realized how crooked the hood was. We'd taken it out of his barn this summer and really didn't pay much attention too it until this week. You can barely clip it down on the left side. If you manage to clip it on the left side, the clips on the right are a good 2 inches away. My grandpa at first believed it was due to him putting the radiator back on wrong when he swapped engines years ago. Would the radiator being on wrong cause the hood to be so crooked or is this a result of a bent frame.

[juke joint johnny]

It could be either !! Best to post some pictures to get some answers

John Cochran

[George Miller]

Sounds like the classic bent frame. bent down at the rear motor mount. A lot of A's are bent down there.

[hardtimes]

Hey DJ,
Pictures might help ? Are you sure that the CORRECT hood is on this car ?

[1931 flamingo]

2" is a LOT. Pictures??
Paul in CT

[Smog Tech]

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28-29 hood on a 30-31??

[SeaSlugs]

Originally Posted by 1931 flamingo

2" is a LOT. Pictures??
Paul in CT

yea I agree - 2" to even get the hood latches snapped in is alot of space... I'm leaning towards wrong year of hood on this car or got the radiator severely mis-installed...

Pictures of the hood, how the radiator is mounted to the frame, and an overall side shot of the car would be most beneficial to us to help you!

Do you know if your car is a 28/29 or a 30/31? If not its no big deal post pictures and we can help - we would like to see it anyways!

[wngtym]

Look at the body blocks between the body and frame. If the wood blocks are soft or rotten it will cause the body to sag thus causing the hood to have bad alignment.

[DJ S]

I'm unfortunately not at his house at the moment, so I only have one picture. Hopefully this will help shed some light on the topic.

[Tom Wesenberg]

That's really bad. I wonder if the car has the 28-9 frame instead of the 30-1 frame with the lowered radiator pads.

[DJ S]

Originally Posted by Tom Wesenberg

That's really bad. I wonder if the car has the 28-9 frame instead of the 30-1 frame with the lowered radiator pads.

It's quite possible. We believe this car was in an accident some time in its life. Both front fenders are buckled up and the front bumper is a 28/29.

[SeaSlugs]

Its VERY common for model A fenders to crack where yours are cracked - just a vibration stress point that eventually gets weak and cracks.

yea somethings fishy with the radiator mounting. please post pictures of how the radiator is attached to the frame and a picture of the front cross-member from the engine side.

i can tell you right now the radiator assembly should be something like this: front cross-member, leather or rubber pad about 1/8" thick, radiator itself, then a washer, then a spring, then a nut.

spring should NOT be between the radiator and frame crossmember.

[Tom Wesenberg]

Here are two frame pictures to show you what to look for as far as the radiator mounting pad. Notice the full frame picture happens to be a 1930 AA frame, but the lowered radiator mounting pad is the same as the car frame. The other picture of the pad mounting area is a 1928 Roadster, which is the same as 1929 until about September 1929, when the new crossmember with the lowered pad was introduced for the new 1930's models. On these late 1929 frames Ford added an extra shim under the radiator mounts, which was about 1/4" thick, to raise the late 1929 radiators to the correct height for the 1929 models.

It's easy to lift the hood and see if you have the 1928-9 frame on a 1930-1 car, which would make your hood set crooked as pictured. Notice the radiator mounting pad is level with the lower edge of the top frame rail on the 28-9, while the 30-1 makes a dip as soon as it leaves the frame rail.

[Bob Bidonde]

Consider the simple approaches first. It appears to me that the radiator is up too high on the front cross member and or the body is too low at the firewall.

There are two simple things that might correct the hood alignment:

1. The radiator attachment to the front cross member should have on each side a hex head bolt inserted from underneath the cross member, one 1/8" thick rubber pad on top of the cross member, the radiator mounting flange sits on the rubber, a coil spring sits on the radiator's mounting flange, a nut and a cotter pin. It is possible that the radiator mounting flange is bent downward. The flange should be 90 degrees from the side of the radiator or there may be too many rubber shims on top of the cross member;

2. The back of the hood can be raised by adding rubber shims under the hood hinge bracket that is screwed to the cowl;

The more difficult issues that could cause the hood misalignment problem are:

a) Incorrect radiator (year or non-Ford) or a poorly made reproduction radiator;

b) Missing blocks and or rubber pads at the body to frame attachment bolts. The body should sit parallel and approximately 1/4" above the running board splash apron;

c) A bend / crack in the frame at the rear motor mounts;

d) 1928 or 1929 front crossmember.

[Logan]

You either need to raise the cowl up, or the radiator down. It's more than likely a bent frame from an accident, or it was treated real poorly earlier in it's life. The fastest way to fix it would be shimming the body, but if you do that you're going to have to re-adjust the doors because by the time you get the hood gap right, the doors will no longer close right. It really takes someone who knows what they're doing to shim a body. Or someone who doesn't mind spending a long time figuring out how to shim one for the first time.

[Brentwood Bob]

Another possibility is that if the original front cross member was replaced with the earlier 28-9 cross member, as has been pointed out above, the replacement was probably bolted in, not riveted as a factory install would have been. That will make replacement with the correct later crossmember much easier, and tell you what you need to do to correct the problem.

[DJ S]

Originally Posted by Brentwood Bob

Another possibility is that if the original front cross member was replaced with the earlier 28-9 cross member, as has been pointed out above, the replacement was probably bolted in, not riveted as a factory install would have been. That will make replacement with the correct later crossmember much easier, and tell you what you need to do to correct the problem.

There was a repair done years ago involving the cross member. Not exactly what was done but that repair could have contributed to the problem.

[Brentwood Bob]

With out pictures we are all guessing.
Bob