Body to frame shims/spacers 1957 Smallmouth

[bnw]

Will adding/removing those rubber pucks from the engine compartment body to frame mounts actually change the upper and lower front wing to door gaps?

 

[CJD]

In general, yes. Remember there are 6 total shim stacks under the bonnet to account for. If you increase the shims, the upper front door gap will decrease...but less than the lower front door gap, which may not change at all. The bumper supports also have to be loosened, as the bumpers bolt to both the frame and the body.

The relation is not direct. That is, the process is that when you increase the shims, the fwd scuttle leans back, which reduces the clearance at the lower rear bottom edge of the door and the upper rear of the door. The hinge keeps the front of the door where it started. Then, if you adjust the door hinges, you can average out the gaps and level the bottom of the door.

If it sounds like a can of worms, it can be if you don't think through what will happen ahead of time...

John

 

[sp53]

Moving the front pieces around did not change much for me. I am not exactly sure why it even has that set up in the front. I do not see it as an engineering marvel more of an engineering cover your mistake. You can affect the door gap by high centering the tub and pulling the very back down with the last bolt at the rear, however that still was not enough for me. I fought the door gaps on a tr3 until I finally adapted the hinges themselves to fit the jam better by bending and shaving the hinge. If you start with a nice example to begin with it might not be too bad to get the doors correct, but usually they have hit something in another life time and they might not have been that nice to begin with.