My drivers door has been hard to close since I had the truck fixed up and painted in 1999. Several years ago at Truckstock Wayne looked at my door and said, "It looks like your hinges are shot. " The door did sag down at the B pillar .

The last couple of years it's gotten worse. Kevin (BigWin) sold me a pair of good used hinges. They arrived on January 8. They sat on my workbench since then. The last three weeks I really had to slam the door to close it. Then sometimes I really had to shove my left shoulder into the door to open it. The last two weeks once I got the door shut right I would slide across the seat, Andy Griffith style, and use the passenger door. And I've been driving my truck a lot since my Tacoma is in body shop jail.

I figured I could not do it myself. Just a word to you young bucks. You're not gonna be strong forever. In 1999 I was able to take the doors off and carry them, one at a time, into our basement to put the weather stripping on. It was late fall and too cold to do it in the garage. In 2016 after the truck was painted again I took the doors off myself to put new weather stripping on. This time I used a floor jack to hold the doors up.

So my son said his wife is going to be with her Dad, so he asked me what I wanted to do. I said burgers on the grill, watch a World Cup game and help me put new door hinges on the driver's door.

The door shuts just like it should.... beautiful! Some gaps aren't perfect but it shuts easily and stays shut!

Looks good from here


Gap is a little big at lower front. I see some weather stripping sticking out .


Gap is a little tight here.


Hinges are green but not Meadow Green. I think I'll brush paint them later.


New NOS striker plate.


Look at the old striker plate.

 

Did your old striker have clutch head screws?

 

The door gaps look good to me. Happy that you got the hinges replaced. A 6 month procrastination is not so much. I am adding front disc brakes and boosted dual master cylinder that I bought from midfifty. So you know how long I have procrastinated.

 

not all came with clutch head screws

 

I don't know what clutch head screws are. I used the screws that were in the old striker plate which if I remember correctly, are original to the truck.


Thanks ManFord. The bottom right of the door sticks out a little bit but hinge movement won't help that. I showed Zach the method of bending a door. He said "that's out of our league." I do know a 2x4 correctly placed can help fix that. I've tried that in the past to no avail.

Yes, 6 months isn't too long, but this has been an issue since 1999. Thanks to Kevin for the good used hinges. When I had the old ones off I could see a lot of movement.

 

Hi Abe,

....."I would slide across the seat, Andy Griffith style, and use the passenger door"...........

I knew right away what you meant. I've been watching old re-runs on Pluto TV and like the way they used to do that in front of the courthouse. Gotta love bench seats, and door locks on one side.

I used the 2x4 approach to straighten the door and hood gaps on a '57 Chevy I had 15 years ago.....and it worked. Scary to think about and comes with a pucker factor, but effective.
Oh and please don't wait 27 years to paint those hinges. At least they are green.....but get that brush out pronto!
Tom

 

Abe, when I took the truck apart in 1997 I had clutch head screws. The new strikers had Phillips head screws. I guess between May and August, they switched over to Phillips head at the Chester plant. (Unless your grandpa changed them).

 

Clutch head screws, sometimes called butterfly screws, have a unique head that uses it's own type screwdriver. They are commonly found in older cars, particularly GM, and inside Holley carburetors.




It also appears the screws you do have aren't exactly Phillips, but Pozidriv, which look similar but have a more positive fitting driver for better torque ability. They were very common on Fords, and what Dennis is describing is probably correct, that '54 was the beginning of the use of the Pozidriv fastener. Using Phillips screwdrivers on a Pozidriv screw results in more cam out and tearing up the screw head. Your screws look a bit driver worn like that. The little extra hash marks in between the driver slots on the head are the give-away. Using the correct driver on Pozidriv screws makes an amazing difference.

 

Wow, I learned something new today!

 

Back in the late 80s and early 90s GM (Pontiac specifically) used a lot of posidrive screws on the interior components. Very small screws.

and the green on the replacement hinges is definitely close enough for horse shoes and hand grenades.

 

LOL. I don't plan on throwing either at my truck.

I think I'll use the oil base paint I had mixed to match Meadow Green I used to paint the bed boards on my 55 F350 flatbed rather than Meadow Green automotive paint. Thoughts?

Here is my striker plate on the passenger side. Looks like clutch head screws.



And I use a flat blade screw driver to tighten both types.