BODY, Buick hood hinges for your Kustom

[brjnelson]

I do not know why I have not seen many cars with this hood set-up, late 80's early 90's Buick hood hinges, I do not know what year (some real tech help here http://www.jalopyjournal.com/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif) or model Buick, (80's buicks are all shitboxes to me) I took the parts off at the u-pick yard, I had 8 Buicks to choose from, the one by the front gate worked for me, $25 for hood & hinges.
There were some other cars that had forward flip hoods at the yard, Edsel pivots looked huge and had a wound spring to lift the heavy Edsel hood and a firewall latch. Saab looked like a good choice, but I did not like the locating pins on the hood that go into the firewall.
The Buick has a latch by the radiator support, pivot pins at the cowl of the hood, that hook into brackets on the firewall. The front hinge bar mounts flat on each side or the radiator.
http://home.att.net/~brj1/wsb/media/196877/site1.jpg
Hood shut with Buick hinges
http://home.att.net/~brj1/wsb/media/196877/site1002.JPG
Pull stock latch and hood pops up and slides forward, from the tension of the 2 springs.
http://home.att.net/~brj1/wsb/media/196877/site1003.JPG
Grab hood and pivot forward.
http://home.att.net/~brj1/wsb/media/196877/site1004.JPG
I did not get a photo of the hinge rod before I started to butcher it up this will have to do.

The first thing I did to the hinge rod (after I had a plan) was to hack the tube that tied the hinges together.Scribe a straight line on tube for alignment. A 1/2 inch od tube fit inside the hinge tube, so it car be telescoped to the right width for mocking up placement.
http://home.att.net/~brj1/wsb/media/196877/site1005.jpg
Here are the pivot pin and catch hook, before they got hacked up.

2 B continued, I have 12 more photos to edit and post on my website to host for the tech.
Stay Tuned

[Machinos]

Wow, that's pretty slick. How heavy of a hood do you think it could support? One day I'd like to do some kind of new hood hinges on my '55 since the hood doesn't open very much.

[yorgatron]

DAMMIT! i was just at pick n'pull today,i coulda grabbed some hinges.that is seriously cool,i gotta do a bunch of work on my hood anyway,may as well do some cool hinges too.

[overspray]

Cool Brian. That setup is off 86-91 LeSabre/Park Avenue FWD. I worked in the Buick shop for 7 years and a couple times this idea bounced thru my head. Good Job. overspray

[flip7262]

That looks really cool, hope to see it at BTT50's.

Mike

[MercMan1951]

That's DAMN slick...Overspray nailed the years of these hinges on Buicks; got a buddy at work that still drives one of those, and I know from experience how the hood works... http://www.jalopyjournal.com/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/mad.gif One question, now that your hood pivots to the front, how easy is it to mess with front end engine related stuff? While replacing a radiator in said '89 Buick, it annoyed me that the hood was "in the way" and I couldn't access it like a "normal" car...maybe 50's cars offer more room and it isn't such a pain...or the coolness factor overpowers it. Again, I was working on a shitty Buick FWD... http://www.jalopyjournal.com/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif

[41ChevyTrucker]

Cool. So about how deep do the hinges set down into the engine compartment when the hood is closed?

[Tinbender]

Very nice! Looks like it grew there. I more or less copied that hinge, only smaller for a model A sedan. Then had it built out of aluminum. Works the same way.

[brjnelson]

Thank you overspray, I thought someone would know what car.
I will try to answer the other questions in the tech.
http://home.att.net/~brj1/wsb/media/196877/site1006.jpg
After chopping to the hinge bar width, I just tacked the mounts to the rad support (just temporarly)
Then I set the hood in place and reached in and marked the location that the mounts met the hood.
http://home.att.net/~brj1/wsb/media/196877/site1007.jpg
I removed the hood and the rad support together, I taped the support to the hood to hold the location.
http://home.att.net/~brj1/wsb/media/196877/site1008.jpg
Because the hood on my wife's Metropolitan is just a skin, no substructure, I decided to use the mounts from the Buick hood substructure, that will make the hood more ridgid.
http://home.att.net/~brj1/wsb/media/196877/site1009.jpg
bracing will be welded in and center edges will be formed, I also will use the foam type bonding that was on the stock buick hood to bond the center sub frame to the center of the hood.

[brjnelson]

I am running out of time, I will just toss up some photos.
http://home.att.net/~brj1/wsb/media/196877/site1010.JPG This photo is looking inside with the hood shut. 41chevytk FYI, the total height if the folded hinge is about 2 1/4, from the top of the pad that mounts to the hood to the tab that the spring is hooked to. The bars are about 1 7/16. The inner fender mount is at the same height that the rad support was, it is all inside the hood when the hood is shut.
http://home.att.net/~brj1/wsb/media/196877/site1013.JPG
http://home.att.net/~brj1/wsb/media/196877/site1012.JPG
http://home.att.net/~brj1/wsb/media/196877/site1015.JPG
http://home.att.net/~brj1/wsb/media/196877/site1014.JPG
http://home.att.net/~brj1/wsb/media/196877/site1016.JPG
http://home.att.net/~brj1/wsb/media/196877/site1018.JPG

[Broman]

Wait just a minute, I almost missed this. BTTT
Good tech here. Tech-o-matic?

[lucky_1974]

Great job Brian that Metro is really coming back together. Talk to later.