Billet hood hinges

[Andy4639]

That is awsume man! Just what kind of bearings did you use and could you give a parts list of what all you bought to make these.This is just to cool idea!

[Mike Bradbury]

I used bronze oil impregnated bushings with stainless steel spacers and 3/8 chrome button head bolts. Rather than milling out a pocket in each arm for a sealed bearing I just made the bushing type bearing. I have made other tools and mechanical devices with these impregnated bushings and have been very happy with the cost effective reliable performance. These hinges are tight and do not wiggle nearly as much as the stock ones did, yet are fully adjustable because I utilized the upper and lower brackets, I just made the custom arms. I did use teflon washers inbetween the arms to reduce and friction from the sliding surfaces.

I had some 3/8 aluminum lying around the shop so I used that for the arms.
I also found a set of struts in the junk yard off of a lincoln town car that had a huge hood. Unfortunately they are a little too worn out and I need to get new ones that are a little stronger.

[Andy4639]

I have a old set of hinges I'm going to see what I can do with them...Thanks for the post.

[AirSpeed]

Originally Posted by Mike Bradbury

I used bronze oil impregnated bushings with stainless steel spacers and 3/8 chrome button head bolts. Rather than milling out a pocket in each arm for a sealed bearing I just made the bushing type bearing. I have made other tools and mechanical devices with these impregnated bushings and have been very happy with the cost effective reliable performance. These hinges are tight and do not wiggle nearly as much as the stock ones did, yet are fully adjustable because I utilized the upper and lower brackets, I just made the custom arms. I did use teflon washers inbetween the arms to reduce and friction from the sliding surfaces.

I had some 3/8 aluminum lying around the shop so I used that for the arms.
I also found a set of struts in the junk yard off of a lincoln town car that had a huge hood. Unfortunately they are a little too worn out and I need to get new ones that are a little stronger.

Very nice work! Have you or would you be willing to make patterns? I would like to give it a try. Again, nice work!
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[Mike Bradbury]

Hey thanks for the interest, I do have a rough cut prototype set of arms that I was going to use but the aluminum was not quite 3/8 so I cut the final arms out of thicker stock. So that is the closest thing I have to a pattern, but in reality, my pattern was the actual steel arm. It puts all of the bolt locations right in the exact spot you need them to be so that the hood closes just like the original hood does. Get yourself some Dyekem marking fluid and a sharp scribe and that is all you need to get a pretty close pattern, the only mod I did that is different from OEM dimensions is that I removed the spring hook on the main arm. I plasma cut the arms a little big so I had room to sand them down on my big belt sander to the correct size.
The prototype arms I have are that over sized rough plasma cut shape and no where near final dimensions. I think you would be far happier with the patterns you already have under your hood.
You might not want to mess with the bronze bushings like I did and instead mill out sealed bearing pockets, it is a little more expensive but there is less mill work in the long run. If you go that route then you might want to consider making the arms out of 1/2 stock so you have enough thickness to mill the bearing pocket. Either way there is a fair amount of fab work involved but just keep telling yourself your saving $600.

[Hart_Rod]

Nice job Mike! I wish I had the time and tools to make a set like you did. Since I dont, , which set of the aftermarket billet hinges are the best? Thoughts and opinions greatly appreciated, .

[screaminchevypickup]

Ive had a couple sets of the eddies motorsports and have really like them..
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[Hart_Rod]

Originally Posted by screaminchevypickup

Ive had a couple sets of the eddies motorsports and have really like them..
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Thanks. Where's the best place to purchase them and do can you post some pictures? Thanks,

Rob

[big_al_71]

Originally Posted by Hart_Rod

Thanks. Where's the best place to purchase them and do can you post some pictures? Thanks,

Rob

Rob here is the link to eddies

http://www.eddiemotorsports.com/stor...uct_list&c=415


I am hungup between eddies motorsports and ring brothers..

Ready to pull the trigger just cant decide which one.....

[big_al_71]

here are the ones from Ring Brothers

http://www.ringbrothers.com/index.cf...ategory_id=125

[screaminchevypickup]

You can go to my build thread there are plenty of pics..
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[Mike Bradbury]

Eddies are the ones I had a picture of but I modeled mine after stock and since I was using the OEM brackets I figured that was a good way to go. Since ith Eddies hinge is very cloce to stock dimentions I would think that factory air would work with these hinges. I am going to be putting in a Vintage system soon so I did not wory if it worked or not.

I liked the Eddies ones but I had more time than money so I made my own, it would have been nice though to just get them in the mail

[hot trux]

Nice!!!!

[Mike Bradbury]

I have heard from a lot of you guys expressing interest in either me making or asking for a step by step instruction on your own DIY. Tomorrow I start a one week vacation and I will be out of town for a week but I am going to try to get a start on a step by step description on how to fabricate your own set. I have described the process in bits and pieces but I might have enough photographs here on my computer to get you guys going. I might have to wait on the second half until I get back from Nor Cal.

First what you need to do is remove all of the rivets in the old hinges grinder and punch method works great but remember you are going to be using the arms as a pattern to trace the new aluminum arms from so don't bend them trying to get the rivets out.

You will also be using the upper bracket that attaches to the hood from the OEM hinges as well as the lower bracket that attaches to the fender so take care not to grind on these brackets where it will be unsightly when finished.

Here you can see just how similar the arms are next to the original because they have the exact same geometry as the original hinge. Since you will not have a large spring on the new hinge the hook that is on the one arm that holds one side of the spring does not have to be part of the new hinges arm. In other words just don't trace that part but make sure all the holes where the rivets went are in the exact locations as the original.



Once you have the holes marked in the right places then you can take you own artistic liberty and shape the arms how you want but keep in mind they have to articulate through out the entire swing of the hinge. I chose to shape mine like the Eddie's version because I knew those worked. I drilled a series of graduated holes in the forward arm just to give it a bit of a custom look. When you get to the cutting aluminum part make sure you cut out side the line so that you can sand to fit perfectly. Unless of course you have a friend who runs a laser or water jet company. I do not but I do have a plasma cutter which made the job easier, but jig saw with a lot of patience and a bunch of aluminum cutting blades will do the trick also. In thapictures below you can see the OEM bracket on the left still has the spring hook on it where as the photo on the right it has been removed. I left a bunch of material because I did not know how much I was going to need, mor can be cut off if you want but having more add to the strength of the lowere bracket. I also used the metal from the hook that was cut off to use as the mounting point for the gas strut, which I am mapping out in the third picture, the final mounting points and welded bracket are seen in the above left picture.

[Mike Bradbury]

Now on the original lower bracket that attaches to the fender you will need to weld a nut to the two main arm pivot points. This is so the new arms can be secured to the bracket via bolt vs. rivet. also you will need to drill some of the aluminum arms straight through and some will need to be threaded. This all depends on which method you will be using for bearings. I chose the oil impregnated bronze bushings because I used the thinner aluminum stock and I was not able to mill a bearing pocket deep enough to accommodate a sealed bearing in the 3/8 stock. I believe 1/2 will suffice if you want to go the sealed bearing route but I did not calc that mat out so I am just guessing on that one. If you have a bearing distributor near you then a trip to the warehouse with a set of calipers is probably necessary. I will describe the method I used with the bronze bushings because that is what is seen in the photos. The theory goes like this; For every joint on the hinge there is a 1/2 (varies depending on the size bronze you buy) hole in one arm and a 3/8 threaded hole in the other side. You do not want to squeeze the two plates of aluminum together tightly because then the hinge would not articulate, it would just be frozen in one position. Therefore a stainless steel sleeve needs to be turned on the lathe to be fit inside the bronze bushing and long enough to allow the bolt to be tightened down leaving enough room foe a Teflon washer to fit in between the two sliding surfaces of aluminum. You can see that I have marked the holes to thread and which to drill in the photo below.

[Mike Bradbury]

In order to make the top bracket that mounts to the hood work with the new arms a bearing must be installed to reduce friction in the joint. the bearing is in the bracket not the arm, the arm is the threaded side and the hood bracket is the bearing and sleeve side. I took a piece of 1/4 stock and drilled a hole to accommodate my bronze bushing but I drilled a smaller hole in the angled hood bracket this is so that the bronze bushing has a surface to rest against when the bolt is tightened. From the top two left photos you can see the size and shape of 1/4 steel plate that is needed, also you get a good idea of the Teflon washers and S.S. washers I used to finish off the hardware. The next two photos show the upper bracket I made for the upper mount of the gas strut, and the last photo shows the lower mount orientation. Keep in mind that I used gas struts from the junk yard that I thought would be up to the task but sadly are not. Make sure when you are fabricating you design around the equipment that is not variable. In other words don't make your bracket just like mine and then discover that you cannot find an 80 Lincoln town car in the junk yard. search out your gas struts and design your brackets to fit them. The ones I used are around 80# I think more in the 120# range is going to work better.
A side note in the top left photo you can see the need for button head hardware so that the heads do not bind against each other when adjusting them.

[Mike Bradbury]

I used a 1/4 piece of S.S. for the link between the two primary arms. The reason I used 1/4 inch is for the bronze bushing I had to put into it. I had to use a different bolt because I needed a shoulder bolt and the button head bolts did not come with shoulders on them. All of my hardware is chrome plated not S.S. I did not want the siezing issues with the s.s. bolts.

[Mike Bradbury]

Here is a simple detail of the bronze bushing I made.

[Ringbrothers]

I can answer any questions you guys might have.