lol cant tell me..." Don't you think that Ford with all it's engineers and designers wouldn't have done it if the hinges could have been "improved" by bending, grinding and changing rivets to bolts?" how many times have you baught something and thought gee wonder why they did this and why didnt they just do this or that ...cmon man!

 

OK, modify away if it makes you happy. If and when you come up with a better mousetrap design be sure to market it, you'll make a lot of money, but since no one else has managed to succeed in 60 years, I won't hold my breath waiting. Meanwhile I've posted at least a dozen times the secret of making the OEM hinges work as they did when new. IMHO the hood opening may have been limited so it wouldn't get ripped off in the wind, plus if it raised higher it would have been difficult to reach it to close it. It opened far enough to do basic servicing over the fenders. If you needed more room you could use a prop or take the hood off in just a few minutes.

 

well weve managed to put a man on the moon and split atoms clone a sheep and make nuclear power , but those hinges? no one in the world can figure out how to come up with a better hinge for a f100. but you made a breakthru with your secrets to hinge magic ...thank you ! thank you!

 

No breakthru, no secrets, just fiddled and tested and researched enough to find how the hinges were supposed to work and what causes the hinge to not pull the rear corners of the hood down. Then I shared what I learned with the rest of the members here. Same as I did with how to align the front sheet metal, how to install the Toyota PS box and other steering options, along with a ton of other how tos in my > 10K posts.

 

I am at the reassembly point of my truck so the pictures of the hood and fitment of the front end is timely. I have the front end and hood set and bolts snugged, a slight bit of tweaking to do but everything essentially fits as I think it should for a 56 YO well used truck. The hood opens far enough for all but the largest among us can get easy access to just about anything in the engine compartment. The hood stays in the raised position solidly. The hood cams to the rear and down in the closed position. The weld had broken at the front of the hinge brace to the hood but was an easy MIG fix.
Think about it guys, how many of these trucks have been bent, maladjusted by the unknowing, and just plane abused. Now, we have some who think these parts should fit like new.
Another point to remember is that these things were designed by guys with slide rules, no CAD programs, etc. So I can not find fault with Ford.

 

Nice job Raytasch! Just shows the parts will fit and work properly if installed correctly. Most anything you needed to work on was towards the front. Most mechanics stood on the front bumper or on the bumper and tire and laid on the fender. Remember these trucks sat high with the OEM suspensions and the tall narrow tires of the day, you had to climb UP just to reach over the fenders into the engine compartment. You can't apply today's vehicle parameters to yesterday's vehicles.

 

You certainly have nice gaps between your panels, nice job that you have done.

 

Wow! If my hood opened that far, I would not have half killed myself trying to get the battery out.

That looks great!