[Dreadlord]

Does anyone know where i could find a kit for spliting the hood of my camaro down the center so it opens like double doors instead of a regular hood? or mabye a site that shows a how-to about it. Thanks in advance

[willys36@aol.com]

Neat sounding project! Actually sounds pretty straight forward DIY project. I would start by carefully stitch welding a couple of 16 or 18 gauge by 1" flanges down the full center of the hood on the under-side. Leave a gap between flanges. This gap should be the same as the thickness of the hinge to get (see below). Then use a MIG with 0.23 wire and argon/CO2 and spot the welds up and down the joint until there is no gap left, all the spots overlap. Done carefully, there will be no warpage. Now using a 1/8" abrasive cut off disk, slit the hood down the 1/8" gap between the flanges. Viola, a split hood!

Next step is the hinge. Get a good quality piano hinge long enough to extend the length of the flat part of the hood. Try to find one with a hefty hinge pin, maybe at a vintage car restoration store? It can't go around a bend and the hinge pin/rod must be removable and longer on both ends than the hinge so it can be mounted. You need this before you weld on the flanges because you must space the flanges apart the thickness of this hinge. Then use rivets or flathead small bolts and nylock nuts to secure it to the flanges previously installed on the hood sides. You will need to figure out some way to secure the hinge rod at both ends of the hood. At the firewall it should be pretty straight forward, but at the radiator end you will probably need to get creative.

[Dreadlord]

thanks man that gave me alot of insight on where to weld at. the hinges will be a little tricky tho.

[MARTINSR]

Honestly, I think the time would be much better spent on detail . Making the hood open "wrong" doesn't make an interesting car,detail does. The most jaw dropping, eye popping cars don't have "gimmicks" they have clean, flowing modifications with lots of detail.

[Dreadlord]

I know what you mean but from a distance what would catch your eye? details that you have to be close to see? or a car that has a messed up hood? i know what i would pick and thats not the only thing im doing to it. The engine is going to look so good it could be considerd a peice of art.

[MARTINSR]

"Detail" doesn't mean tiny details you can't see from a distance. "Detail" is anything you do to the car that ADDS up to the overall picture. Believe me, a well detailed car can be seen from a distance. It "glows" with perfection.

Let me exaggerate, an "art car", you know the ones with a thousand cameras bolted to it or something like that? I love those darn things by the way, very creative. You can see from great distance all the goofy stuff they have done to it, but you can also see how well they did it. I have been to get togethers of these cars, some are done very skillfully with attention to detail, you can see the difference from across the street. So be it covered with wild mods like the hood you are talking about or nothing at all, the detail stands out.

That being said, the biggest thing to overcome in your plan is the hinges. I would suggest making a "Hood" out of cardboard or better yet foam posterboard and designing the hinges with them. I am thinking a hinge similar to your typical "suicide door" hinge or "hidden hinge" kit for street rods. The arc and length of the hinge will be extremely critital to making this work. Because of the curvature of the hood you will have to make it lift up pretty far before it swings to the side or it will hit the fenders. The placement of the hinge pin will have to be very close to the underside of the top of the fender skin to make this happen.

I can't imagine how the "piano hinge" would work, first you could see it with the hood closed, pretty ugly. Then, it wouldn't be strong enough in the short length you would be limited to do the curvature of the hood.

You could shoot for a hinge simlar to the hinge that is on the hood now, look for these with some aftermarket pickup bed covers. I just did a 2004 Chevy truck at work that had the coolest bed cover I have ever seen, very high quality. It had some small hinges that worked in a sissor fashion just like the original hinges on a Camaro. At least up until the eighties, what year is the car you are working with anyway?

There are also some very cool street rod hood and decklid hinges on the market that would do the job.

[RodFather]

The kit you are looking for is sold by Autoloc. I have seen these done on imports. Not sure how it will work on a heavy hood.

[MARTINSR]

Yeah, I don't think it could work on anything as heavy. It looks VERY borderline on a featherweight Honda hood. (Click here for Autolocs site)

And again, as I have said many times, this is NOT a "kit". It is a pair of hinges and some super lame instructions.

For those who don't want to go to the site and see these instructions, this is it in a nut shell. They are akin to someone selling a pile of 2x4s as a "kit house" with the instructions reading "cut into needed lengths and nail together to form walls and a roof.

It is MUCH more of a project than they would like you to believe. In my opinion, if you are sharp enough to make this mess work, you would just make some from scratch more suited for your particular car.

[Dreadlord]

hahaha thats funny about the "kit". and im sure it would work if you used some linear acuators and put a little physics behind it. yea i can tell some people dont like my idea but i think it would be cool to do because you dont see that very often and i like impressing people with work i do on my own.

[MARTINSR]

The fact that I don't like the idea for my car doesn't matter one bit to you. For that matter, the fact that I don't like it for my car doesn't mean I wouldn't walk over to check out the workmanship in your car at a show.

If you like doing things like this, do it. But I suggest you save your money on that lame "kit" and design your own. The strength of the mounting is one of the most important things. Don't skimp on that or you will be sorry. That is one thing I have seen with many instructions with things like those hinges as well as suicide door hinges. They really don't give the strength required the respect it deserves. SUPPORT up to those hinges is critical.

[Dreadlord]

yea i wasnt planning on buying the kit. I was going to go buy some steel tubing and some straight iron and weld my own together. any sugesstions on the best way to make a hinge for something like this? ( 300 dollars for something that small is sad)

[willys36@aol.com]

Dread; with the varied opinions you have received, especially the negative ones, I would go for it! It is precisely the things people say can't be done that I most enjoy doing!!!!! I would still track down a reproduction hinge from a 30s car and adapt it.

[MARTINSR]

Originally posted by willys36@aol.com
Dread; with the varied opinions you have received, especially the negative ones, I would go for it! It is precisely the things people say can't be done that I most enjoy doing!!!!! I would still track down a reproduction hinge from a 30s car and adapt it.

Putting 2004 Honda Accord front fenders, hood and bumper on a 36 Willy's would be dumb and you couldn't do it anyway.

[dinger]

Originally posted by MARTINSR
Putting 2004 Honda Accord front fenders, hood and bumper on a 36 Willy's would be dumb and you couldn't do it anyway.

So is putting a Mack truck front end on a Volkswagon. How did this evolve from splitting a hood? Dan

[troy-curt]

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Putting 2004 Honda Accord front fenders, hood and bumper on a 36 Willy's would be dumb and you couldn't do it anyway.
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Putting honda fenders on a willys would not be dumb, if that's what the owner wanted to do to his car. And I think willys36 could do it if he wanted to. I've seen some of his work here and it looks good to me. Just because it's not the way you would do it, or something that you don't like dosn't mean it's not the right way.

Splitting the hood on a camaro would be way cool, if it is done right, and has the good detail that you mentioned. From a judges view point it would be some big points on a custom.

Troy