ryan22

I saw a photo of a 58 fuelie that had the hood support bracket on the passenger side and the lower mounting point was not on the inner fender as I thought they always were.

Here's a link to the thread with the photo. It's the 5th pic down.

https://www.corvetteforum.com/forums...-corvette.html

Again, the 58 pictured is a fuelie, don't know if they had a different lower mounting point for the hood support bracket ?

Anyone have a photo of the lower mounting point of the hood support bracket ?

Thx-

rich5962

Ryan, Very early '58's had the support on the right. I haven't seen one up close in a while, but the hood support base mounted to the radiator support. I don't believe it was a FI only oddity.

I mag'd and cropped the photo of that Silver car to show it below. The top bolt has a nut on the forward side through the side extension. IIRC, the bottom has a blind weld-nut on the radiator and a open hole in the rad support and side extension for the bolt to pass through and attach to.

Due to generator clearance issues as production continued, the support moved to the left. Early generators had their mounts to the exhaust manifold positioned in such a way that the belt was dangerously close to the lower radiator hose. When they changed the mounting hardware to eliminate the clearance issues, the hood support had to move over to the left. I forget the vin/timeframe of these changes. It's in my library in the shop and will check it later.

Rich




1958 right side hood support mounted to radiator support.

ryan22

Rich- Thanks for explaining the reasons for the relocation of the hood support. I read it happened around mid-model year but didn't know why.

Looks like a right hand mount hood support is yet 1 more one year only part for the 58's- but only the ones built the first 1/3-1/2 of the model year.

ryan22

One last question on this topic-

After they moved the hood support to the drivers side, was the passenger side radiator support changed so that there would not be any holes to mount a hood support there ?

rich5962

Ryan, The holes were spaced apx 1 7/8" apart normally by design. This accommodated the hood support spacing, as well as the normal mount for the rad support to the rad support side extension, and the top radiator mount hole. There was never a change to the radiator support, they just moved the hood support over the the underside of the DS hood ledge/gutter.

The 1929 to 1959 P&A Catalog lists the 3744856 Radiator Support in use for all 1958 & 1959 Corvettes. Changes occured after that for Top Tank Aluminum Radiators in 1960, then Aluminum radiators in '61 & '62.

The Hood Support for 1953 to 1957 is 3706354. The spacing on both brackets is 1 1/2". It measures approximately 15" fully extended.

The Hood Support for 1958 through 1962 is 3739384. It has the 1 7/8" bolt spacing for the base, and 1 1/2" spacing for the hood. It measures approximately 17" fully extended.

Rich