I'm not sure if this belong in general tech or appearance, so moderators feel free to move it if you see fit.

Well, I trial fitted the new SLP Ultra-Z ramair hood tonight. Getting it to line up required alot of slotting the brackets on both the car and the mounting holes in the hood. It was a major PITA. I got it to fit as good as it is going to get with my skill set, but it is not nearly good enough. The problem is the outside front corners stick up like 1/4 inch over the fenders. The front center is flush, just not the corners. I know nothing is holding them up because I can apply pressure to them and push them into allignment and they dont hit anything to stop them, they just stick up.. AArrrGGHH!!

I'm going to have my body man look at it tomorrow to see what he suggests. If it is not usable, I'm going to see if SLP is aware of a issue in the manufacturing process... maybe it's warped?

Here are some pics.... Anyone have any suggestions? Anything??

http://24.196.89.146:2980/webshare/hood1.jpg
http://24.196.89.146:2980/webshare/hood2.jpg
http://24.196.89.146:2980/webshare/hood3.jpg

 

Mine did the same thing, I still haven't got it alighned properly. I slotted my hinges, brackets, and all the holes on the latch bracket. (so that the hood latch could move down by a 1/2 inch) The damned thing is still too high on the passenger side by about 3/16 of an inch. Tough part is, once I get that right, I need it to move left. It sits too far over to the driver's side. I'll need to make spacer plates for the hood to do it. Jesus.

It's not user error either. Me, and two very expereinced body men, have attempted to no avail to make it look stock. I can't return it, my body guy primered it before he fully test fit it, making a return impossible. 800$ after shipping, and I get this crap.

SLP =

 

Aftermarket hoods regardless if its SLP need alot of work to get right and you may never get it compleatly right. good luck. I have to put on hood pins to bring both front corners down on mine!

 

You can raise the side fenders slightly by lossening the screws that run on the inside of the fender in the engine bay, then lift up the side fender and tighten down. Probably not enough to get what you want though. Another option is to epoxy strong angled brackets underneath the hood to hold the corners down, then paint to match the underside of the hood.

Dan

 

We understand that with any aftermarket hood, there will be some fitment issues. However, when you pay almost a 1,000 dollars for a hood, issues like this should never come up.

 

I agree.

I just got back from the body shop. Gary had some ideas on making it fit better, all involve adjusting the car, not the hood. He thinks I have the hood adjusted as good as it will get. I'm going to remove the passenger side fender and do some massaging on the fender rail. It is apparent that it was in a collision at some point and the repair was not done correctly. Once that is fixed the passenger side hood/fender gap will be the correct size.

As for the corners sticking up, they have gone down a little all by themselves it seems, but still stick up. Gary said that it is possible to loosen up the fenders / nose brackets and perhaps lift the surrounding body up to meet the hood, or at least close enough to where it looks acceptable. He also noted that painting the hood will make it less obvoius. He said that the grey primer color really makes the misallignment stand out.

So hopefully a combination of straitening the fender support, adjusting the fenders and nose and painting it will produce an acceptable result. I'm pretty confident it will, Gary really knows his stuff. He has worked on several 4th gen Camaros in the past.

It was also Gary's recommendation that I do the work myself. He saw the work I did installing my drivers side door and said it was perfect. He said many local body shops would not had gotten it lined up as well as I did. He says it is apparent I have the skills to fix it so he suggested I save my money and do it myself. he will paint it afterwards. He's a honest guy and a great painter. I was lucky to stumble across him.

Wish me luck... I'll attack it again this weekend and hopefully see some results.

 

Well, raising and lowering the side fenders IS normal, even with a stock hood. Having to epoxy brackets to the underside of the hood is extreme though, I agree.

I wish hood aftermarket manufacturers had a better reputation overall. I'm constantly hearing problems about aftermarket hoods not fitting well.

Oh and TABHAR, good luck.

Dan

 

After about 6 hours of screwing with it we got it fitting perfectly!

I had to remove the entire front clip from the car, nose, both fenders....

We slotted the bolt holes in the corner brackets that connect the headlight bar to the fenders and nose. We then moved that bracket up 1/4 inch and bolted it down. We straitened out the collision damage that had gone unrepaired from the previous owner and put the fenders on, closed the hood and VIOLA!! A little fine tuning and it was fitting like it should. I am sooo relieved!!

Now, I have to finish puting the front end all back together and take the hood to Gary for paint. I must admit there was a lot of satisfaction in getting it to fit myself and I'm sure I saved a ton of money at the same time.

Well, it's late so I'm off to bed. See everyone tomorrow.

 

Great Job!!!

Now get us some pics of that bad boy!

Dan

 

I just got my aftermarket fenders gapped all proper like. Next comes the hood. That's tommorrow's project.

 

You'll probably end up re-doing the fenders. ouch.

 

Nope, all I need is left/right adjustment. I've already slotted the brackets, and got the heigth issues over with.

Thanks for the encouragement though

 

This may be a stupid question but wouldn't moving the fenders make them meet up with the doors funny? Also...wish me luck since my new aftermarket front bumper cover is coming in a couple days and I hope the damn thing fits! I did some research here and other places and ended up getting it from autobodyparts.com---I talked to a couple members that bought a bumper cover there and said it fit perfect. I'm keeping my fingers crossed!

 

The fenders are flexable, you can move one part without affecting the fit of another part. ....to a degree...

 

Ahhhh....nuff said. Thanks