Hey folks, My old 48 sits pretty straight, and everything looks good , except for my dang hood.For some reason it won't open up high enough. It hhangs rather low. And when the hood is closed it is about 3/4" above the seal on the cowl. Any way to adjust this? I am trying to get these things done before paint. Thanks,

 

As crazy as it sounds I think you need to adjust the hold down pin at the front of the hood. I'm basing this on what I have read about adjusting the front sheet metal on the 53-56 trucks.

I think if you move the latch pin towards the front of the truck and maybe release a bit of tnesion on it it might drop the back of the hood down. again, don't quote me on this as I havent tried it on my truck (I'm along way from having to align body panels) but it seems to help the later trucks

Good luck
Bobby

 

Thanks , I will take a look at that. The hood latch works very smooth. It doesn't act like it is pulling the hood back. But, it still may need some adjusting,though. I will be working on it a little bit this weekend ,and will try that. Any ideas on why the hood doesn't come up all the way. Could that just be weak hood springs?

 

It could be springs. They don't open as high as you think they should. I can't tell you the number of times I've hit the back of my head as I moved out from under the thing. Eventually you get used to staying low........

On the hood fit.... I have the same problem and haven't tried to solve it, but I did read someplace about moving the hinge brackets up as high as they would go on the firewall/cowl. Something about a camming action. If they're mounted low the hood stays too high. If it works let us know, please.

 

How far does the hood open? From looking at the pic that Frankcowan posted in your "running board" thread my hood opens about that far. Here's a recent pic from when I had my son installing my valve covers;

 

Hey Bobby thanks. By the way, I 'm diggin the Road King. Bikes have been my passion for 30 years. This truck will kind of showcase my custom painting business. Was that a plug for my business? I guess I'm just used to a hood being higher when up. I have a couple of knots on my melon head also.

 

LOL...yea, my son had some issues with it also. Here's a pic of him working on the other side of the truck (I think he's looking through the slit in the hood......lol)

The Road King is awesome! I bought it last August, its a 1994. The bike had 5800 miles on it when I bought it. I too have always had bikes but this is my first Harley.

 

Hang on to that bike. It is the first year , I believe for the Road King. Maybe the second, but hang on to her if you can. I just sold a custom shovelhead that I built from the ground up. Hated to see it go, but I wanted this truck real bad. I have a '98 Road Glide that I completely redid this last year. I got mad at the EFI system on it, and when I got home that day, I ripped every wire off of that bike,and went to a carb system. Now ,I have 4 wires running my whole bike. Before ,I had 2 five gallong buckets full of wiring on that bike. I will see if I can load a photo of it here. Thanks again for the advice.Looks like your hood and mine are about the same.

 

Bobby has already shown the hood opening on your year, but I just thought I would post this too. The later hood (53-56) do not open very far either. I asked the same question after I bought mine. It is annoying, but at least mine opens, shuts, and stays up fine.


If it went up higher, it would break the windshield.

 

If it pops up in the rear (buy the windshield) when its closed it sounds like the springs are bad....

 

On the same topic, I often wondered about using late model gas struts to hold the hood up, but alwaqys suspected they would push the hood in all the wrong places when it was shut......anyone tried this and failed, let alone, succeeded???

 

Here are the hood adjustment instructions from the shop manual. These are large scans so I didn't post them full size, click on the page to bring up the full size scan:

<a href="http://www.fatfenderedtrucks.com/scans/48_52hood01a.jpg" target="1"><img src="http://www.fatfenderedtrucks.com/scans/48_52hood01a_tn.jpg" border="0"></a>

<a href="http://www.fatfenderedtrucks.com/scans/48_52hood01b.jpg" target="1"><img src="http://www.fatfenderedtrucks.com/scans/48_52hood01b_tn.jpg" border="0"></a>

<a href="http://www.fatfenderedtrucks.com/scans/48_52hood01c.jpg" target="1"><img src="http://www.fatfenderedtrucks.com/scans/48_52hood01c_tn.jpg" border="0"></a>

<a href="http://www.fatfenderedtrucks.com/scans/48_52hood01d.jpg" target="1"><img src="http://www.fatfenderedtrucks.com/scans/48_52hood01d_tn.jpg" border="0"></a>

 

Oou 54 opens fine but when you close it you have to keep going from left to right side and push down on the back corners or it will not come down at all in the back. Whats that all about? You have to do the pushing down as you close it not after you close it.

thanks
pete

 

I seemed to have the same problem on my 53 but my hinge brackets had broken at the weld.so before I had the engine reworked I swapped the hood mount to open at the front away from the wind sheid.now my only problem is checking the radiator level.But she opens all the way clear of the engine comparment