Having removed the bonnet prop way back in February, (Where does the time go?) I've been using a fiberglass shaft, as a prop rod. It works, but I am always worried that the bonnet will come crashing down on me, or worse, flip completely over and damage the car/bonnet.
I sent the prop off with my dad for stripping, and he returned it, sans hardware, in a perfect acid-etched primer condition. I was going to replace the hardware anyway so it wasn't that big a deal and the rod looked very, very nice.
Something didn't seem quite right with it. There were simply too many spacers in the middle and once I eventually got hardware I wanted to use on the car, it never seemed to fit right at all. Several attempts were made to install it, I was never satisfied with the results so I would pull it off. I eventually thought about it long enough and it dawned on me that one of the pieces was flipped. I referred to one of the literally hundreds of digital pictures to reference how it was assembled prior to removal (Take plenty of Digital Pictures, even if you aren't shooting something specific. You never know what you'll need to reference). Removing the extra spacers and flipping the piece removed all install issues.
When I get there, the rod will be painted black as I plan to have all interior painted black, except for under the dash panels. I want to leave the original Laurel Green under the dash for future owners to discover if they ever venture that far in parts removal. Installed, the rod is definately functional and should last another 40 years.
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