my hood doesn't close!

[Mjfan12]

I don;t know WTF the problem is, the hood refuses to close all the way, I can only get it past the safety but never to locking position no matter how hard I slam it.

I thought the hood latch was bad so I swapped a brand new one (not used) and the problem still persists.

could this be due to the actual relase cable? I found a new one for like $13 but how difficult is this to install?

I dont know how, but the mechanic and the kid I bought it from messed around with it with a pen and it works after that, but I dont know what they did so Im driving around with it partially open and air gets under it, reduces my gas mileage and even though the safety is there, Im scared that it may fly open so I drive like a granny and its just super annoying.

[accordaffair]

Mine new 93ex did that when I bought it. I had to replace the cable....its a bit of a pain in the ass.

It runs behind the drivers side fender, so you should remove the fender to get to it.

But to remove the fender you should remove the drivers side headlight.

But to remove the drivers side headlight you must remove the bumper.

So bumper off, headlight out, the cable runs under the radiator support beam, so I removed that since its easy.

To get the fender off, open the drivers door, get those bolts behind the hinge, and the under side sill is grabbing it. Bolts are also under the hood, top of the fender. There are also 2 where the headlight bracket meets the fender and body.

The cable runs through a hole down behind the fuse box, to the latch. Remove the hand latch assembly to get to the cable and release it. The other end meets the hood latch mechanism, I removed the latch mechanism to get it off, 3 bolts. I also took that time to clean all the grease off with lacquer thinner and regrease it with white lithium grease.

It's a lot of work for something so simple, but oh well.

I wound up with one extra bolt though....can't figure out where I missed it....still sitting there on my window sill

And if you press the lever that the cable attaches to at the hood latch assembly, it will eventually lurch back. Then you can close the hood, but you have to do this everytime. That's prob what you're friend was doing with the pen. I was using a piece on my swiss army knife to accomplish the same task.

[cali-racer]

either that or something is causing ur hood to not go down all the way! or ur hood latch got bent down for some reason.

[SteveB]

Your cable is stuck. Push it down manually at the latch.