Door alignment tips?

[ActionZ]

Hi guys,

Picked up a new bronco after my last one had engine issues and was crashed by the dealership. The new one must of been built before a long weekend because the quality is pretty meh, especially the door alignment . All 4 are not aligned well, I've never seen such poor alignment on any car. The tilt is fine but the in and out is not. The rear passenger is too into the body at the lower edge and does not align with the front, it also has a weird pop and a bit of resistance when opening. The left rear is too far out and just barely clears the front door when opening.

I just seen 3 bolts, on the hinge I assume these are the ones to loosen to move the door around. Anyone do this and have any issues with window gap and leaks after? At this point I trust myself over the dealership. Thx.

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[Doc TOC]

Door aligning is a tedious trial and error task to the beginner. Without the jig a lot of body shops use, balancing the weight of the door can become tricky. 1/2 degree of shift can result in 1 cm of gap (triangulation). If you are up to it, then go for it.

You could try taking the doors off, adjust the hinge plates, then put them back on and see how well you did. Again, tedious.

If you don't trust your dealership, try another one.

Or ask a (large) body shop how much they would charge. The larger ones are more likely to have experienced techs and the door jig.

It's your time and your money. Figure out how you want to spend both.

I hope this gets done to your satisfaction.

 

[ActionZ]

Door aligning is a tedious trial and error task to the beginner. Without the jig a lot of body shops use, balancing the weight of the door can become tricky. 1/2 degree of shift can result in 1 cm of gap (triangulation). If you are up to it, then go for it.

You could try taking the doors off, adjust the hinge plates, then put them back on and see how well you did. Again, tedious.

If you don't trust your dealership, try another one.

Or ask a (large) body shop how much they would charge. The larger ones are more likely to have experienced techs and the door jig.

It's your time and your money. Figure out how you want to spend both.

I hope this gets done to your satisfaction.

Thanks for the valuable info. I didn't even think about the jigs. Was thinking of just loosening and moving it little by little while on the car. Now thinking about it, I was to naive and didn't consider the weight would make it sag.

 

[CalvinT]

Was thinking of just loosening and moving it little by little while on the car.

This way lies insanity.

 

[ActionZ]

Ok I found this video and went ahead and succumbed to my insanity haha.



Loosen the 3 bolts and shift it around until the doors align. Now it's all good in alignment. The only thing still not great is the rear passenger door still opens with a pop meaning the latch is mis aligned still. You can't move the rear so I guess the only option is to hammer it a bit up and down. I'll just leave that for now haha. At least the doors are aligned now with no chance of rubbing. Only other thing is the paint on the bolts are stripped from the socket but it looks to be galvanized so I'm not too worried about it. I'll spray some CnC rust Inhibitor on it just in case.

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