Door Hinge

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Major System Category: Body (Door)
Task: Door hinge
Parts: Door hinge and internal frame
Prerequisite Tasks:
Additional Costs:
Time Requirement: 5 - 6 hours
Date Started: November 11, 2012
Date Completed:  November 14, 2012
The door hinge, the internal frame, power window motor, window tracks and the latch really need to be part of the same discussion. If you just install the hinge without thinking about everything else, then you are going to end up taking everything apart and redoing things anyway. the latch and hinge are on opposite sides of the internal frame. The power window motor and window tracks  happen before and after this section.

Front trim panel for driver's side door. I found it useful to have a table next to the lift  as a work area.

I am going to break things down into multiple sections. The major consideration here is that each of these systems have to worked together. This is what makes the door construction a pain. Unlike so many other things, where you can focus on one item, you will need to keep all of these items in mind as you build the doors:

1. Hinge
2. Power window motor and tracks (not attached)
3. Latch
4. Door poppers (optional component)
5. Shaved Handles (optional component)
6. Side mirrors

Hinge plate set in place so I could get a preliminary placement prior to cutting holes. I added sound proofing to the interior of the door. I would strongly recommend this as the doors seem kind of thin.

The manual makes this entire process sound like a pleasant walk in the park. While there is nothing overly complicated, there is lots of adjustment. Let me repeat that: THERE IS LOTS OF ADJUSTMENT.

The hinge and trim plate set in place on the door. Everything seemed so simple at this point. However, I have read enough on other builder blogs to know this is anything but simple.

The first thing I notice is that the manual makes everything look very simple to fit together. It does fit together, but not easily. If you follow the instructions and measurements, you will be off to a good start.

This is a close up of the hinge plate and the internal frame as they fit inside the door. They are not  bolted together yet. The black metal piece is the window track.

The front door trim panels are smaller than they look in the manual. it is easy to miss them in the sheet metal box. I found a Dremel tool with stiffer cut off wheel to useful in cutting the openings for the hinge plate. Burrs and jagged edges can be smoothed out using a sanding drum. Anything bigger is going to get in the way. These doors are not that large, and it seems they get smaller as systems get installed.

This is a photo much further along in the process for the door build. It shows the  hinge plate and internal frame bolted together. Some of the electrical work is complete and those cables snake out through the opening above the hinge plate.

There are two sets of bolts to work with. The first set connects the hinge plate to the internal frame. (Keep the socket wrench handy, you are going to need it to move things around.) the second set of bolts connect the front of the hinge through the square holes for the trim plate. There is a certain amount of adjustment room for these connections. However, these adjustments become more limited when the latch is attached on the other end of the internal frame.

Preliminary Fit

<< Initial measurement and Mounting                        Door Hinge >>

Major System Category: Body (Door)
Task: Test fit the door
Parts: Door
Prerequisite Tasks:
Additional Costs:
Time Requirement: 3 hours
Date Started: November 08, 2012
Date Completed:  November 10, 2012

There is a lot of things happening with doors. There are multiple systems (both mechanical and power) taking place in the door. The doors are fairly light (prior to installing all the hardware), so they are easy to move around to get an idea of how the doors fit on the car,

This is GTM #402 coming off the truck. You can see the tape along the door edges holding the door in place. When this happens, the leading edge of the door (inside the front cove of the body shell) is right up against the hinges that are part of the chassis. There is no way the hinges installed on the door can be that close.

When the car arrives, the doors are taped in place. This is deceptive. When the car is shipped the doors are pushed past the hinge points on the chassis. This makes it seem like the doors are already fitted in place. Reality is much different. The rear edge of the door is over sized and needs to be trimmed.

This is second photo of the tape used to hold the doors on for shipping.  When actually fitting takes place, some material will need to be sanded off the rear edge of the door.

Note: Hold off trimming any part of the door until the hinge is installed on the door and you have preliminary mount on the chassis.

The hinges attached to the chassis right above the puppy's head.

The other item I anticipated was that the upper and lower hinges for the door match the alignment of the hinges on the chassis. When the door hinges are properly aligned, the lower hinge is canted further away from the door than the upper. This allows the bottom of the door to be canted at angle closer to the body shell. I didn't understand this right away and ended up with an initial fit running a huge gap along the bottom of the door.

These are chassis hinges with the body shell installed. The door hinge fits on top of these hinges and you drive a hinge pin through. The chassis hinges are in vertical alignment. This is much different from the Corvette door set up, where there is much more room to work and the hinge pieces are much easier to access. This really is a two person job. Or a one person job with a little bit of luck.

Note: The lower hinge mounts closer to the chassis than the upper hinge. This supports way the door rests inside the body shell (i.e. the lower part of the door angles outwards and upwards to the top of the door).

Close up of the bushing. These are made of brass or some similar soft metal.  They will  rip apart  on you if you don't get the door in place just right. Fortunately, you can order extras from Amazon.

I managed to wreck a pair of hinge bushings. The Dorman 38377 part is a suitable replacement for these bushings.