Trunk lid hinge repair options?

[toyotafreak]

Calling all your thoughts on a path forward...

Pulled the engine hatch/trunk hinges because they're sloppy. There are two nylon washers, one between the inboard side of the hinge and the cap of the hinge's pivot rivet, and one between there and the stationary part of the hinge. Mine's sloppy due to the demise of the former. Believe Rick's got them covered at $60 each. I'll probably look around for another pivot rivet first.

Bigger concern are problems with the corners of the trunk itself and the rusted out threaded inserts. Rick's got that covered too with a $600 trunk B7t I can't go there. The captive threaded inserts are rusted out and the plastc backboard is cracked. Apparently stainless won't stay stainless when trapped like that. I'm about ready to remove the vinyl from that area and perhaps insert a new backing plate with new threads on the foam side. Not sure what else to do and really don't want to open it up...

Again, any thoughts will be appreciated!

[cyclone]

Exactly the same issue. I was thinking of a piece of 2" aluminum angle wigb 1" cut off so it doesn't stick up in the gap between trunk and engine lid. It would be secured by short stainless panhead plastic screws mounted to existing lid. Capice?

[toyotafreak]

Might just work, but I need powerpoint to understand ☺

Still thinking how to solve the trunk corners. Thinking more towards opening up and installing stainless plate between backer board and foam, then somehow attaching captive stainless threads to it where the original captive threads were at. I know, needs powerpoint.

Went to local McFadden-Dale today in search of a stainless rivet or similar to replace the pivot pins. No joy. Guy recommended just using bolt and nut, which would make sense if there's room to punch through the fiberglass there. Have to look more.

For those times where screws are stripped in fiberglass, West Marine has sick stainless inserts. Looks like they'd be awesome. Downside is they're $10 each!

[toyotafreak]

Powerpoint for you

[toyotafreak]

Here's an inside view of one of the offending corners. Was thinking an SS plate here on this side but jot sure how to affix nuts to it.

[toyotafreak]

Trying this for the hinge pivots. Have to open the holes a little bit, then this slides in from the back. Low profile 1/4 20 macine screw comes in from the front.

[cyclone]

Think of a piece  of 2" angle aluminum that is the full width of the trunk lid. On each end, the existing brackets and pivots would be mounted. I would drill holes every 4" down the length of the metal for sheet metal screws to attach to the plastic base in the middle of the lid where the plastic is still "good" Talking about 1/2 to 5/8 screws so they don't stick through, probably snip the points off.

I would cut off, with a disk, the top 1" or so of the other side of the angle so it doesn't stick up in the crack between the engine hatch and the trunk. Don't know about clearance issues, but it's clear in my head:)

The better choice would be to strip the cover off the base part and clean it up, use it as a mold to make a fiberglass base plate for the lid.

[toyotafreak]

Pete, I gotcha. One thing to watch is that there are rows of staples to hold the vinyl down. I'm thinking more like a 16g ss sheet on the backside. It's held in with scews like you said. Some nuts, or worst case t-nuts, are tack welded onto the plate. Would love to sandwich ss on both sides of the corners but it'd give staple problems. Will probly just do the back side.

I'm redoing the hinge pivots too because they're sloppy, that's all.

[FreeLance]

I spent a ton of time trying to figure out a better way for the trunk hinges.  Bottom line the amount of surface area for the hinge attach point for the size of the lid makes for a likely failure area.  Mine were already broken when I bought the boat in 2004.

I did a complete redesign using hinges I purchased from the other epic marine.  The ultimate goal was to do a 3 piece hatch so the engine cover could stay closed and we could access the vdrive lockers whenever we needed to.  That ended up being overly complex, although I feel I left it as a possibility of the design for a future revision. 

Long story short it would have been easier/cheaper to shore up the corner hinges.  My thought was to leave everything as is but place a 6-12" piece of aluminum angle from the back corner toward the front.  Screw it down over the vinyl in 6-10 spots and then thread through it at the back corner where the hinges go.

I have a ton of pictures of the build process if you are interested in them.

Toyotafreak, I have my old hinges I no longer use or need them.  I will ship them to you if you want them.

[toyotafreak]

Looks great! Thanks but don't think I'll need the hinges.

[toyotafreak]

Shit. What a pain-o. Think four times before heading into fixes in the Spring. All back together and pics to follow. Pain-o in my stank-o.

[toyotafreak]

First the hinges. Recall my issue was the inboard nylon hinges were eaten away to nothin and the hinge pivots were sloppy. Drilled out the original hollow rivets. Expanded holes a bit to receive Lowes stainless 1/4" x 20 brad nuts. This serves as pivot. Replaced nylon washers - two thicknesses. Thinner inboard, thicker outboard. Red Locktited 1/4" x 20 truss screws from the inside. Truss head is nice because they have a wide flange but are narrow depth-wise. After Locktite was all set up, I used a disk grinder cutoff deal to trim and thin the bottom edge so it wouldn't interfere with the gelcoat in the area. These turned out real nice. I think the brad nuts will hold if I ever have to pull the screw out to replace the nylon washers. 

[toyotafreak]

Next, the trunk lid mounting nuts. The stock tee nuts were not stainless (magnet grabbed them hard). Starboard broke up, perhaps my fault because we went a while with the gas shock disconnected, and without it, the trunk would hyperextend open and put a bunch of stress on the hinges. So...we fabbed stainless sheet (my guess 18 gauge but not sure) for both top and bottom of both sides. Trick thing here is how the underside rests on gelcoat. In one of the pics you can see a pencil line drawn from inside the locker. Any nuts or screw heads that protrude within this area could rest on gelcoat. So...we picked up the three hinge mounting holes as well as two other #10 screws far enough inboard so as to not interfere with gelcoat. The stainless brad nuts are #10 x 32 and are held in place using stainless 1/8" rivets through just the inner (upper) stainless sheet. Rivet simply keeps the brad from turning. After the gussets (?) were ready, I cut the broken Starboard out and grafted in some green nylon cutting board, secured with Monel staples. Stainless staples are a bit cheaper, but Monel is what West Marine had when I got desperate. You'll use a crapload of them putting the vinyl, then the Epic covering, then the trim piece on. Maybe 4 sticks. I did end up trimming the vinyl back a bit to match the edge of the gussets. Pics later. I'm really happy with how this turned out. Props to Dad for help with stainless, Mom for suggesting the Starboard graft, and boy Brandon for how to get the second (lower) side reinforced. 

[toyotafreak]

Then off to Havasu to hang with old friends...