Installing Eddie Motorsport’s Hood Hinges

Our Project 1955 Bel Air is hitting some big strides. The chassis is done, engine is installed, and the car is painted. We’re installing tons of new parts and chipping away and getting this car back to looking better than new. Thanks to Eddie Motorsports billet hood hinges, the hood is working better than new as well.

The stock hinges on this car worked okay. The issue was that they wouldn’t go up in unison, so the hood was always twisting weirdly. Instead of messing with them, we figured this was the perfect opportunity to improve on them with a set of Eddie Motorsports billet hood hinges. These are much stronger than stock with tighter clearances, so they don’t allow the hood to flop around and chip paint.

Who Needs Instructions?

Now if you read the instructions, this is a pretty easy install. Naturally we said how hard can it be? And went at it without the instructions. The basic installation is a piece of cake, but there’s a few mistakes we could have make if we actually read those instructions first.

Our first mistake was deciding to not pull the hood off and just swap out the hinges one by one. Even with two extra sets of hands, this proved about impossible fighting this big awkward hood. The second and more important reason is there’s trimming involved. It wasn’t until we got the new hinges on did we realize that you need to trim the pinch welds under the hood a bit for clearance.

In theory though, you’ll remove four bolts; two holding the hood and two going into the firewall and remove the factory hinge. We’d suggest doing this with a couple of buddies and just removing the hood all together. Then you can trim the pinch welds with ease.

They Don’t Fit?

The other part that had us scratching our heads a bit is the bolt hole spacing on the new hinges, specifically the holes that allow the new bolts to into the firewall. These are offset and we thought for sure they were mis-machined. After some head scratching we realized that they are correct – the issue is a trick of the mind. We wanted the top of the hinge to be flush with the top of the firewall. However on these Tri-Fives, the firewall curves – so the hinge is vertical but is a bit deceiving because of the factory curvature. Where were those instructions again?

With the new hinges bolted the firewall and the hood bolted on, we the installed the new gas struts. Eddie Motorsports has different gas struts for different weights of hood, such as if you’re running a cowl hood or fiberglass hood. The ones in the kit are perfect for a stock hood, which is what we have. After we popped them on we noticed it wasn’t smooth and that’s when we discovered we had to trim those firewall pinch welds. Again if we’d only read the instructions, right?

One Finger Operation

With those trimmed up the hood was now opening and closing buttery smooth. You can open and close it using one finger – try that with stock hinges. The best part is how the hood doesn’t flop and wobble around. These new Eddie Motorsport hinges have way more adjustability in them than the stock hinges, so we were able to get our gaps lined up perfectly.

Now the our hood has Eddie Motorsports hinges, and the trunk does too! If you need hinges for your ride, check them out at EddieMotorsports.com or give them a ring at (909) 581-7398