is there a fix for the loose wobbly hood?

Ok, so my '96 5 lugger was in a very minor fender bender prior to my purchasing it. It bent up the flimsy front bumper, and also put a hole in the A/C condenser. Anyways...it also bent the hood latch support bar that runs from the latch down to the frame. I took it to an autobody guy at a local tech school and he pulled the mounts and threw a new bumper on it for me. He also straightened out that hood latch bar. That made my hood pretty loose and I could see it fluttering down the road at 70. Kinda unnerving. So, I pulled the front plastic grille and bent the hood latch bar a little more, adjusted up my rubber bumpers and voila! Tight hood with NO play. Pull your grille and try it. Shouldnt take much, maybe a 1/2 inch or so. Even if your truck wasnt in a accident this should still help to take the play out.

 

https://www.tacomaworld.com/threads/strongly-considering-hood-latches.368084/page-12#post-17689342

 

Redline hood struts to solidify things a bit?

 

So here is something I found out.

The Tacoma hood has no center support by the windshield for 1995-2000.

In 2001 -2004 toyota made a center hood support by the wipers.

I glued a piece of heater hose and now there is Zero hood movement.

ZERO fluttering.

APPARENTLY toyota saw this issue as they added the extra hood support in 2001

 

There might be a possibility that the 2001-2004 cowl might fit with the rubber support as part of the cowling for the 95-2000 tacoma hoods

 

if I could fit a new cowl like that from later model into mine it would be good
mine is getting a bit sunworn (i think) been so long since I seen what a damn 'new' one should look like lol

 

I like the free version.

 

does it have a bug deflector on it? I had one on my 98 and took it off because of the vibe on the hood. Looked like it was always loose and distracted me.

 

Mine did the same thing, so I adjusted the screw type rubber mounts up front. This helped a lot, but pushed the hood past flush with the finders. I am not a fan of how this looks, so I am going to start with changing out the hood latch. This is the only thing that could have worn out enough to allow this much slop. Had a bug shield on for years and took it off recently, hood does the same with and without.

 

I am not sure which one or if it was a combo of all did it for me.... I pulled off the old seals & made an outer one from a garage door insulator/weather strip. I had some 10mm hose left from switching out the old tired vacuum ones, & after seeing toyota wanted 30.00 for the inner, I said what the heck. Thing with this is it's a really good fit. I had just painted the hood a few days back & I can just see where the hose meets the hood when it's closed. If you look real close you can see this in the first pic. Other thing I did was take some of the oddball pieces of the garage door insulator & wedged them in where the adhesive was no more between the hood & the support. Just took her for a ride down the highway & it felt awesome to not be all twisted in knots waiting for the hood to fly off....

The lighting made some stuff look orangey....



Zippied on for now. wasn't sure it was going to work out & I may try to find a way to afix it to the hood. Who am I kidding. It'll still be there in a year....