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MG MGA - Front fender to door gap

When installing the two front fenders, the bolt pattern that secures the aft portion of the fender vertically to the inner body panel are fixed points. That said, the fender cannot be moved forward or back for adjustment.

When installing the doors, how does one widen the gap enough to clear the leading edge of the door to the the matching fender edge? Should the door hinges be shimmed? And what is the best material to use for the shims.

The car has recently been repainted and I am trying to avoid any door rub or binding on the fender edge.

Fran
F Valenzano

Hi, Fran--

Barney covers the topic of shimming the door hinges pretty completely; see, for example, http://mgaguru.com/mgtech/body/bd103b.htm . Also check the archives of this forum ("door adjustment", "door hinges") for a number of useful threads. I've use the fiber packing that Moss supplies; it seems to have just about the right amount of compressibility. There's a thread somewhere that described the art of the Abingdon workers in fitting the doors, who among all else were able to tweak the fit by selecting different thicknesses of packing as needed. Good luck!

Ken
Ken Korey

Last time around (two years ago) I devised a slick trick for aligning door hinges without using shims at all. The short explanation appears on my restoration web page RT-625, like this:

While aligning the doors I seem to have innovated another slick trick. I assembled the hinges securely with all screws but with no shims, leaving the door slightly farther forward than the desired final position. I tied/taped a thin steel wire to a piece of drill rod, suspended the drill rod between the hinge plates near the hinge pin, then pushed the door shut slowly, a little at a time, for the desired result. The drill rod holds the hinge slightly open while the force on the door pushes the hinge plates together. This bends the hinge plates a bit resulting in more space between the hinge plates, giving a result similar to adding a shim(s) to the hinge, but without needing a shim. It worked like a charm, but before anyone asks, I was prepared to buy a new hinge if I happened to break one.

Mind you this has little or nothing to do with aligning the fenders. Final body assembly of the MGA usually starts in the middle with the doors, making hinges and latches work. After that, don't touch the doors, but align the front and rear fenders to provide the desired gaps. This should be done before final painting, then disassemble, paint, and reassemble in similar manner.

I find 5/16-inch is a decent target for door to fender gaps. Plus or minus 1/16" depending on available time and patience. If you can fiddle with it long enough you might get it down to 1/4" all around, but don't count on it. I find there is enough variation in original body panels to make the gaps vary significantly from top to bottom, so if you make the gap smaller it may look worse. The ultimate fix for this on a show car with small gaps is to add a weld bead on the edge of the steel fender panel, then grind it back to finish with the desired even gap all around.
Barney Gaylord

Fran, It should be possible to move the front wings in a front/back direction because the four vertical holes (1/2") in the body flitch are larger than the screw diameter (1/4"); large penny washers are used on the screws to prevent the head going through the holes. This gives a theoretical maximum of + or - 1/8" adjustment.
On any particular car however, this maximum might be reduced by relative inaccurate positioning of the holes and/or fixed nuts.

You say the front door gap needs widening but you don't say what the rear door gap is. If this is wider than the front then adjusting the door by shimming is the way to go but if the rear gap is already tight then you might try adjusting the front wing.

First check whether the front of the wing lines up with the corner of the front body. If it does then loosen all the wing screws except for the very front one and compress the wing from the front. If it doesn't move then you may need to open up by filing whichever hole(s) is preventing it moving. If it does move then you will need someone to tighten up the screws while you are keeping it compressed.

Good luck .............Mike
m.j. moore

Some good advice on this thread but a lot of time and effort from what I can see. From my experience the hinges were shimmed by the factory, the trick is to get the "shut faces" correct and then turn attention to the front guards. If all else fails, sometimes due to panel damage in the car's (long) past, you can build up the rear edge of the front guard with lead/solder and then file back to get the desired (and consistent) gap. Mine are quite small, say about 3 mm or so (I think that 5/16 is far too much). A panel beater friend showed me how to do this, it is nowhere near as difficult as it sounds, a strip of flexible ply clamped on the rear of the guard edge is necessary. As a matter of interest, I understand that the door gaps on early Porsches (at least, when consistent panel fit on their limited production was not being achieved) were done this way!
Barry Bahnisch

On the subject of the door fouling the wing it's interesting to watch the front edge of the door as the door is opened. A point on the door edge will move forward towards the front of the car and, at the same time, move inwards towards the car centre. The reason the edge moves forward is because the hinge axis is nearer the car centre than the door edge.

I've just done some measurements on my car door and the hinge axis is about 25mm nearer the centre of the car than the door edge and 30mm nearer the car rear.
Using simple geometry the door edge will then move forward by 1.7mm (1/16") before the edge clears the 2mm thick wing edge.

This 1.7 mm can be reduced by moving the hinge axis either (1) outwards from the car centre, relative to the door edge, and/or (2) towards the car rear.

There is quite a bit of slop in the hinge attachment so to satisfy point 1. before tightening up the hinge screws try and move the hinge as far out as it will go.

Also if you are shimming the hinge then to satisfy point 2. place the shim(s) between the hinge and A-post rather than hinge and door.

Barry, On the subject of lead loading there is an interesting section on building up door edges (for steel doors)to reduce gaps in the Australian book on Panel Beating by Donald Wait. I've not been too happy with my own attempts at lead loading I think mainly because any pitting from rust interferes with the tinning process. Doing it at the factory on new shiny metal would have been easier...................Mike

m.j. moore

My friend Tony recently bought an A and wasn't happy with the driver's door (it was full of filler). He got a panel maker (in Birmingham)to fabricate a new skin for it - we stood and watched in awe as he made it from scratch in 2 hours with a brilliant fit. First he removed the original skin ( except for the triagular but at the top) - then straightened the door frame. Then he stuck strips of card to the edges to get the right gap - then cut a sheet of alloy to size and proceeded to bend it into shape.(See attached photos)

Cam Cunningham

Here's a photo of the nearly finished door.

Cam Cunningham

And here it is being worked on - amazing

Cam Cunningham

Cam - That is indeed an amazing process. I believe that would be called the "art" of fabrication.
F Valenzano

Like most owners I had problems with the door /wing shut gap. In the end I tig welded a bead along the leading edge of the door and then filed it to match the wing profile. As Barney says 5/16" looks about right and is optimum for minimizing differences. I found that hours spent on working out the best shim thicknesses also paid dividends in the end. I've seen professionals just heat up the hinge in situ to cherry red and merely bend the door to fit. I assume you have a roadster. If its a coupe then that's another story again with the window fit to the body.
J H Cole

It is fascinating to watch skilled professionals at work! Having done so I now do practically everything myself. Our Veteran Car Club has recently purchased a set of videos of the rear quarter panel of a Holden Monaro (well-known Australian "performance" car but body panels are long since unavailable) being made by a chap in Melbourne. Amazing and well beyond the capabilities of even the most experienced panel/body experts! I have seen such people at work in the UK but did not know that we had any in Oz!
Barry Bahnisch

This thread was discussed between 12/08/2010 and 13/08/2010

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