Door alignment

getley

Question of the Day.
I am having problems aligning my doors on my 37 Terraplane. The top rear space is way too narrow the two lines down the side don’t line up the forward gab seems a bit wide. Looking at the Hudson manual only show adjustments with suicide doors. How do you make adjustments to line things up. And using what tools?

Nerve_Center

Just looking at your pictures on the club forum. Firstly, put the hammer away as the paint looks too nice to take to it with the hammer!

Is that the door originally off the car? Was the car painted with the doors off the car? Can the striping come off? How are the gaps all around the door?

The top of the door gap looks OK which makes me ask is this the door off the same car because the left gap should be much better than that even though they weren't great off the assembly line. Without a total refit and painting maybe you can drop the whole door down on the hinges so the pressing and stripes line up. Best to do that with a bit of weight in the door simulating a fully assembled door.

On the assembly line, they used a tool called "brute force". Jamming packers into the jamb strategically and hanging off the door to bend it into an acceptable fit. You cant do that or the top left will be too close.

Hopefully this prompts someone to offer a better solution for you.

getley

Thanks thats a step in the right direction. The stripes are part of the door so they can't be moved. The doors came off the car.

KustomKreeps

Without pics its kinda hard to get a feel for what you are talking about.
But I have used jacks with wood cushioned with a towel to gently square up or align pillars and hinges before.

Maybe throw a few pics up getley.

Alex

getley

Here are some pictures to show what I was talking about as suggested

Nerve_Center

Hmmm! The rest of the gaps look pretty good so you cant just drop the door down. You might need to settle for taking the advice of KustomKreeps but be prepared to file that top gap so it fits without rubbing and of course, the door will need a paint touch up I'm afraid.

Geoff

The workshop manual shows how to do this adjustment, using hand and knee!

ken1962

Maybe the door frame is warped causing the skin to be out of true? If you cannot move the door I'd increase the width of the two lines and hide the fault from your eyes  cheers Ken