Hello everyone, I have a couple of questions. I have a 1978 chevy truck I have been working on for a while. I have rebuilt the motor. Put a shift kit in the tranny.I also have redid the interior. Now on to my questions. I know most trucks have problems with the hood closing all the way. I have put on another hood from the salvage yard. I oiled the hinges real good but it still wont close properly(sticking up above the fenders)What is the best way to correct this? And question number 2 what do I need to do to get a more comfortable ride? I replaced the shocks but it still rides rough. Any tips will be appreciated.
For the hood you should ajust the hood bumps in the front corners, and if the back is to high for your likes ajust the back hight stricker at the corners. For the front .There is two steel clips that close lock the bumps." on the rad support " 2x4 4x4 1\2 Ton or 3\4 Ton What type of work do you do with the truck.? Is there a lot of springs on the truck.? What type tires do you have on, Heavy load 6 up ply or light truck tires.? What type shocks do you have on.? Now if the if the 78 is set up for heavy loads it will be a little rough, 73-87 trucks of these yr are not the smoothes riding, unless you set the them up for not more then 1\4 Ton load.( use three spring set, gas charged shocks light load ones, light pass car\truck tires.{ cant work the truck hard but a lot smoother ride.} for a 73-87 yr truck. You could take out one leaf per side if you really do not need that meany for what you use the truck for. You will have to find a happy meddom for heavy load & smoother ride that you can live with. This should be a good start you have to find out what the truck is going to be uesd for the most.
Thanks. I will start checking that out this weekend. I know the shocks I have on there are elcheapos so that will be a good place to start. Ill also check out the leaf springs. I wont be working it hard at all so that wont be a problem. Do you have a brand of shock that you would reccomend? I sure hope your advice with the hood helps me out. It is driving me crazy. It ruins the looks of the truck.
Let me ask another question, does any thing lock the rear of the hood into place. By rear I mean the part close to the windshield. The reason I ask is with my hood closed I can lift the rear of the hood a good 1-2 inches. I can force it down even with the fender but when I let go it pops back up above the fender. Thats why I was wondering is something suppose to lock down the rear of the hood.
What did you use to oil the hinges? My brother had the same problem with his '73 Blazer, and spraying it with WD-40 took care of it. And there is nothing to lock it down, the hinges are just pushing it up.
The hood springs on these trucks wear out over time. If they bind up when the hood is open and you force the hood closed it could bend or fold the hood. Ruining the hood Go to lmctruck.comto get some factory replacement hood hinges. They also sell a hood brace kit for about $20.00 so the hood will not fold in the middle with bad hinges. You could also do like I did on one of my old trucks that just would not line up due to some frame damage and drill out the rear hinge mounting points a little further down. This brought my hood back in line with the fenders. just be careful and use the old carpenters motto ' meassure twice and drill once' - hope this helps you some.
I used Procomp 9000 series shocks on my truck.They work pretty well. I also replaced the past worn out body bushings on the entire truck with new Poly bushings. It's still a 4x4 and and old truck (mine's a '77) so its' not going to ride like a new Silverado. but then I could not take a new Silverado the places I can take my beast.
