Fit of doors on RF GT40

Ron Earp · 10-12-01, 06:43 PM

Those that have fit doors, how did they fit?

If I take my doors and place them onto the chassis/spider and made sure the sides are aligned properly, I do not get flush alignment on the top of the door. The area I'm referring to is the top of the door where the door and spider meet, basically where your head is - the curved area.

When the sides are correctly aligned it appears the door is sunk down about 1/2" on the edge at the center of the spider. Do the "eyebrows" account for this depression and make up the space? Or, do I have some type of issue on alignment?

Thanks,
Ron

Gordon Levy · 10-13-01, 09:53 AM

Ron, Congradutlations you have now entered the bodyman's zone. The car I have here the door fit very well. Do you have the main body permenately mounted in place? As with most of the handbuilt cars you will have to do some adjusting. If you call me I can help talk you through it. 480-446-8442.

glayne · 10-15-01, 04:27 AM

G'day Ron

Yes I had the same problem with the doors and to overcome this I found by unfastning the front apron and pushing it a touch forward, would assist with the door alignment.
Cheers
Glayne

Ron Earp · 10-15-01, 07:54 PM

Front apron, is this AUS speak for the front clip, or the front of the car? The gap isn't much, I'm just wondering if the eyebrows take up the space.

Otherwise, it seems like one would want to take the top of the door and bend it upward a slight amount.

I haven't fiddled with it that much, just a small obervation. Once I mount the spider permamently I can tell more.

Ron

Paul Bearman · 10-24-01, 08:20 PM

If you haven't finally fitted the Centre section, undo the bolts below the windscreen & push the 'T' section up or pull down to achieve a good fit.To achieve a good door fit to center section, I used a hot air paint stripper 'gun' & a bag of cement!
Heat the door pillar(carefully) and place the bag of cement on top of the door. The heat will allow the door top to drop, & the bag of cement will hold it in place until it sets.

DMatt · 01-08-05, 10:58 AM

As some of you may know I now have RF 44 which I bought from Ron. I also have begun to look at the door alignment and I think it can easly be lined up by tweeking hear and there. My question is this... It seems to me that there should be some adjustment in the door other than up and down on the front hindge. I thought by slotting out the holes where the hinge mounts to the frame would give all of the adjustment that would be needed. I took the bolts out and played around with the door in the spider and it seems like it will work fine. has anyone else done this? My fear would be that the car was designed to have the rest of the body fit around the fixed door location. I'm sure there is some give and take here. I have very limited experance with body work but it seems fairly strieght forward.

Any thoughts?

Dan

Mark Worthington · 01-08-05, 01:22 PM

You're right, Dan. When Hershal helped me fit the doors he would oblong the holes through the chassis, as necessary to allow things to line up. Just make sure that when you bolt the hinges in that you use "outside star washer" so they grip and prevent lateral slipping. Also, make sure that you keep the holes through the hinge body as tight to the bolts as you can. Adjustments can also be made to the spyder to get the doors lined up. I had to shim the bottom of my spyder a little below the right side A-piller so that the door edge wasn't sticking up above spyder.

You're on the right track.

Ron Earp · 01-08-05, 06:04 PM

Dan, those holes are slotted already. They used ot fit perfectly, but I imagine with the transport etc. they have changed but they can get back to where they wre.

Ron

Steve Kulper · 01-08-05, 06:29 PM

Hi Ron,
Are the door rubbers in place? If not this will also change the way the door sits, also if not already done install the lcoks as you can adjust them to help align the door.

Steve

Dan Weilacher · 01-08-05, 08:27 PM

Just thinking, it would be nice if the car had those matching serated plates like on some production cars. Just back off the fasteners, move the hinge point and tighten and nothing would ever move or shift on you .

Ron Earp · 01-08-05, 09:06 PM

Once fit you should simply put a tack weld on it. That way nothing moves and you can easily cut the weld if needed.

Ron

DMatt · 01-09-05, 09:02 AM

Thanks for the help guys. I put the weather strip on the spider and adjusted the hinges and now the left door fits perfect. Everything else already fit real nice.

Thanks,
Dan.

Ron Earp · 01-10-05, 08:32 AM

Dan, I am off to Boston for this week so it is probably likely that I will not be able to get the front dress materials off to you until next week. I am sorry for the delay on that, but will get it done.

How has work on the car been going, what sort of things do you have planned?

R

DMatt · 01-10-05, 05:38 PM

Ron, No big deal, after all we all know work is a direct violation of leasure time!

Right now I'm temporally putting on weather stripping and checking fit and alignment and it's working out great.

I do have a question for you or anyone else who would like to chime in. Does the rear body work have weather striping on it where it touches the spider? I looked through all of the pictures I could find in the manual and on the RF 40 web site and I did not see any shown. I have seen it on pictures of other GT40s. It would seem that there needs to be something there so the painted surfaces would not touch.

Dan.