[nh68gto]

I need help!!!!!!!!!!............ Trying to mount the endura nose (is mounted as right now)

Can't see how the front of the fenders stay were you need them to be. At the valance area were it mounts to fender the fender is IN from the nose. Does something hold the fender in place.

I do have these two small plates I got from Bethels, hole on one end and a elongated hole on other, dont know where they go....

I need any and all mounting to valance and fenders, Pics would be great.

Hope I make sense in what I am trying to describe.

Thanks, Dominick

[gto4evr]

Those plates you have go on the bottom valence/fender bolts and connect to the outermost radiator support/wheel well bolt. They are what hold the fenders stationary at the bottom of the nose. It can take a considerable amount of tweaking getting all the holes to line up. You need to have the wheel wells mounted if you don't already. Loosen up all the mounting points of the wheel well if you have a problem pulling it over. One trick is to put long screwdriver through the holes on the rad support side after you bolt the valence to the fender then pull the screwdriver straight, clamp the edge with a visegrip so you can pull the screwdriver out and get a bolt started. The bend angles forward in them.

[nh68gto]

My wheel houses are not in yet. The small brace I see, thats the one I have (I think).

Most of my problem is up by the nose, where the horizontal mounting for the valance is, if I pull on the fender in that area it looks great. Is there no bracing in this area other than the valance. But hood area to the top of fender look fine, (fender rolls in to nose as it gets closer to valance.

[Greg Reid]

I just installed my valance panel a couple of weeks ago. I do not have the inner fenderwells installed.
I installed the braces exactly as gto4evr has his.
Kinda hard to picture what the problem is based on your description. Do you have the core support adjusted properly? Also, the little brace shown in the photo above will help pull the lower part of the fender in.
How about the valance, itself? Is it straight? Twisted?
It does take a lot of twisting, pulling and pushing to get it all lined up.

[nh68gto]

This what I am dealing with. The area that butts to the nose if I pull on it looks great (almost perfect) but I cant keep it there....

My valance is unfortunally the crappy fiberglass one, don't know if the whole can take the strain I am pulling on fenders to keep them there. I amost want to make a brace to hold them (or am I missing something)

Here are some pics, any advise will be great. I will be messing with this more today.

[gto4evr]

There are alot of factors involved. First off, you can't really make a brace to put it where you want it because the outward bend of the fender is controlled by the width of the valence panel. As in, if you pull the fenders out to meet the nose, the valence may be too "short" to match up to the fenders. Your fender adjustment might be currently compensating for the rad support being shifted and not centered. As Greg was refering to. This is really involved getting the front to line up correctly and I had all original sheetmetal up there when I did mine. It may be the repop valence being too narrow. To do this right, you need the wheel wells installed as well as the hood. Your endura may be tweaked ever so slightly which spreads out the nose making the fenders want to be further out at the top which rolls the bottoms of them in when the valence is installed. That will be more easily noticeable with the hood in place and you can see if the gap is the same between the center point and the ends of the hood.

PATIENCE and your 1/2" socket is the key as you'll be tightening and loosening every bolt on that front clip to tweak it all into shape. The best move I did when I was getting ready for paint was to put the car all back together one last time for a test fit. Every piece I had was from original clean donors and I couldn't believe how bad it all went together initially. Took me 3 days of messing with it, moving the fenders, nose, hood, wheel wells and rad support back and forth before everything finally lined up to my satisfaction. Without doing that first I would have destroyed the paint on my panels if I'd have had to go through that again after paint.

Only good news I can give you is I had that same exact condition you're picturing on my drivers side before all the adjustments. Part of my fix was moving the core support more towards the drivers side, even though the passenger side wasn't pushed out the equal distance. Those two small fender braces are adjustable to some extent, that's why one side is slotted, so it can push in a bit closer or pull out a bit further from the rad support. Good luck

[nh68gto]

Alright now here is a bigger problem. Car is painted and all assembled hood, doors ect.

The hood to fenders to top of nose are great its only the area I put in the pic, After getting some hardware I am going out now to see what I can do.... I hope the valance will push the fenders where I need them, and keep them there...

Wish me luck

[nh68gto]

Well after a full day of messing around, This is what I got.

Driver side is livable and hood latch is not in (do to it being a piece of $&!%) so hood will come done more..

Pass side fender needs to come out more about a 1/4" but valance will not let me.

I guess over all, for a fiber glass valance and never having this nose on car I did OK....

When I can find a factory valance over the winter for a decent price I will get it closer.

Night pics not the best.

[Greg Reid]

I've seen a lot worse called 'good'.

[gto4evr]

Dominick, that your vert your working on? Paint looks great on it! So how's your blood pressure doing every time you move that nose? Do you have the upper stabilizer brackets on the ends of the endura that press into the rad support? -- they're always missing the rubber covers too. Those help the nose from chattering against the fenders.
I also notice you don't have the jacking reinforcement brackets on there but if you're just test fitting it, you wouldn't have bothered putting them on.

[Roadbuster]

Domanic,

You should not have to put any load on the front valance to get the fenders lined up. The rest will stay lined up with out the front valance in position, so it should not have to have any load on it. Good luck and keep adjusting. You will get it so that it looks right to you. Very nice paint on your 68!

I just took off my front valance. Scared the hell out of me that I was going to scratch it! My front end lines up pretty well and it does not have those braces (I just ran out to the garage to check. Darn now I have to look in my parts pile and see if I can find them!)

Jon

[nh68gto]

Originally Posted by gto4evr

Dominick, that your vert your working on? Paint looks great on it! So how's your blood pressure doing every time you move that nose? Do you have the upper stabilizer brackets on the ends of the endura that press into the rad support? -- they're always missing the rubber covers too. Those help the nose from chattering against the fenders.
I also notice you don't have the jacking reinforcement brackets on there but if you're just test fitting it, you wouldn't have bothered putting them on.

That it is the car...Was waiting for some one to ask. Its all done just adjusting the nose and loading doors and trim and interior. You guys will get a full shot of the car soon, Patience grasshopper.

I don't think I have ever seen that bracket. I May do some more tweaking to the nose, but with this fiberglass valance I don't think I am going to get much closer. I will go on the hunt in the winter for a metal one. Just want to get a little time with it before snow flies.

Dominick

[Constant]

I am also assembling the front end sheet metal of a 68 I bought in a basket. I am looking at the pic of the front fender bracket. It appears there are two sets of holes of which the small bracket goes in the bottom set. What is mounted in the top set of holes? I can see bolts and clips but it looks like it might be something mounting from the wheel side? Any info or pics is greatly appreciated.

Thanks, Joe

[nh68gto]

In post #5 the last pic shows fender to radiator support that is where the small brace goes (bottom hole), that and the valance is what puts every thing in its place.

Take your time you may put together and move a ton of times, I know I did, but then again I am using a fiberglass valance (came with car).

[Greg Reid]

Here's the drawing from the '69 assy manual. It's confusing I know but between this and the pic posted above you should be able to get it together.
Copy it to your hardrive, flip it upright and zoom in on the section.