I was going through my car and making sure all the panels are adjusted before I send the car off to paint. I am having a hard time adjusting the front hood to the front bumper. I have practically ripped the entire front bumper off trying to fix it (which relates to my other posts on Vacuum lines) and I think I have come real close. My question is on spacing. I posted awhile about this and I was told 5mm was a good gap but I think was talking about the door to hood space. I have noticed on some vettes that the gap is real close on the hood to front bumper. looking down on top of the hood I see the gap is real close, almost to close. I believe the hood might be scrapping the paint on the top edge of the hood. But, as I look to the right or the left of the bumper, say three inchs before the bumper ends I notice the gap gets bigger. The current gap from the center of the hood to the bumper is about 1 mm. The gaps at the end of each side of the bumper seems to be 4 mm. Is there a reason the ends flare out? It almost seems like I need to push the corners in just a tad. Should I take the hood support bar off thats under the bumper cover and try and pull it back? Or, am I missing something that pushes the corners in? What should the gap be?

 

sorry about the font. I was trying to be creative.........it didn't work.

 

I have the same situation with my 87. Factory bumper skin fit very well, repacement (genuine gm) did not. Same as yours. Tight in the middly and loose on the ends. To my knowledge, shimming, twisting and pulling cannot fix it. If I would have seen it before the body shop painted it, I would have taken my recess scriber, set it at 5mm, got the bumper perfectly straight on the car(on the tight side, 4 mm at the loosest point)and ran a scribe mark acrossit. Then I could have sanded to the scribe mark and had a pretty perfect bumper. Now that it is painted, I am stuck with it.

 

Thanks, That not a bad idea. I'll give it one more tug and pull and see if I cant make it better.

 

It's been a couple of years since I've put one together, but I'm thinking SOME of the alignment might be changed via the connection between the bumper skin and the styrofoam crash pad.

If not, I'd align the hood to the doors first, then do exactly what you're doing. If you can't get an even gap, I'd scrib the gap and remove material as suggested.

3mm gap would probably work, but I'd go 3.5-4mm. I think 5 is a little too much.