My 58's hood latch is completely dead. The spring is gone, and it stays unlatched until you manually push the latch over the bar when you close the hood.

Any ideas where I can score a new latch and/or spring? I'd like to make the hood a bit more secure too, so if you know of cool locking alternatives I'm open to suggestions.

TC

 

a master lock and lock hinges

 

Sounds classy. Maybe I'll just put a few woodscrews through the hood and into the fenders. Who needs to open the hood anyway?

 

theres an ideer

 

EXCELLENT IDEAS! You can never be too safe you know. It's no fun when you're cruising along at 70mph and that darned hood pops open and folds over the cab. Yes, I've seen that happen.

 

whut kinda ijiot our youes.... uses that thar duck tape, it **** in all kinda prutty colors, and the color match is so closed that yall kant even tell i got duck tape holdin the hood down.

 

I do .. I never miss an opportunity to show off my sixer.

 

58, go with the stock hinge. My neighbor borrowed my master parts catalog so I can't look the part# up for the latch. Mine fits extremely tight and works excellent. Can't go wrong with factory ford stuff..... -4speed

 

my latch was a chain and a lock wraped around the bumper. also my hood did open up at 70, it didn't fold over the cab but did get a good dent in it

 

My hood opened up once too right after I got the truck , at about 50 mph.
Did'nt hurt the hood or cab but sure did tweak the hinges!
I see NOS hood latches on Ebay all the time, so you might want to check there!

 

hood latch part # b7c 16700-a , If you go to eather e bay or greens sales co or partsvoice or even ford you may be able to get a new one. I still always check to make sure that the leaver is in its grove.

 

I bought one off of ebay for 15 bucks...they are in the LMC catalog, obsolete ford parts catalog, etc...

 

QUESTION....do all 57-60 hoods rattle and bang around? Mine always has about 3/4 of an inch of play, and that's annoying. A guy at Dennis Carpenter told me that it was the "nature of the beast". I have replaced the hood bumper rubber pieces and it still bangs on bumps and dips. I have thought of installing a spring loaded rubber piece like on some other vehicles to hold it up a bit in those situations.