[PolynesianPowerhouse]

So AlphaCamaro7 came up, and this crazy Samoan had an idea. Lets cut hood vents into our cars. We both had the idea for a few months now and there's a post in cosmetic section about it but the guy never got around to it.

No worries, I'd figure this to be easy as I snuck a GT500 hood vent into my 2007 charger hood. blasphemy? I don't care... FUNCTIONAL. that's my goal, get the heat out!

So to start on this, you can make a template many ways.

I basically started with the original outline of the actual vent. easy to trace, and then measure from the edge of the vent to how far in to the clips. the front half of the vent where the water drains, its EVEN all the way around. But the bottom half of the outline will have 3 sections where the clip is actually a bit LESS of an indentation.




By the time today came around, I stopped at FedEx/Kinkos to use the cutting machine, cutting board and duplicated the original template.

there's a small trick I learned after the only mishap on mine. and its due to cheap tools, which I'll gladly point out shortly. I made sure to work on mine first, so no F-ups would be done to anyone else's car. being a car guy, I can live with scratching, denting, my own stuff. Not cool with doing it to someone else's car, especially when it would be learning on the first car, then perfecting by the second car.

so here's the final version of the Hood Template.



now to make this even easier, see the parts where the TAB goes... instead of doing the cutting for the tabs, first, make the inner perimeter all the way around the same distance, like at the top.

Then after you make the outline of where to cut, where the tabs go, just dremel sand away an extra mm or so. this will make it far easier than going in and out, in and out where the tabs go.

Now once you have a template, keep the inner and outer template together. the inner line where you cut, don't cut 360 degrees around. leave just the ends (curved sections) attached. this will keep everything located. you can score or trace the inner line of the template by eye

1st step, once you got everything is removing the under hood liner. the areas to cut are already there. and unlike the 5th gen, there's NO inner hood structure to cut through as well. just an open single panel. use a trim tool, or panel fastener remover.



once that's out, be careful removing it, it CAN and WILL TEAR if forceful.....place your template in that area, and tape it there. afterwards, I drilled 3 holes spaced out. it'll make sense shortly.





So now that you have the 3 holes drilled as you can see above on the underside, there will just be 3 holes on the top side

flip the template over 180 degrees and now you can transfer the same template from underneath to on top. use pegs, screws, dremel bit to put in the template holes and align it on top. tape the edges if need be to make it easier to stay put.

I had a spare under bumper screw from when I added the splitter, a self tapping screw, and a dremel bit of 1/8 diameter that I put in the 3 holes.






So after all is aligned, just start cutting on the line, all the way around... eventually once all is cut, you'll "have a hole in your hood"

But then, you can plug something in the hole.





Basically you repeat the same for the opposite side. also you can cut the peg tabs off the ends. its there for alignment, but its extra holes you gotta drill in the hood.


As for the under hood liner.... easy, no brainer. its already scored on where to cut. and to show how easy it is, I have a key knife. looks like a key, in the middle there's a small utility knife. that's what I used to cut out the felt liner thingy for fire suppression and noise reduction.





Now that you got it cut, put the hood liner back in, there's 3 tabs near the bottom to put in the back of the hood. helps with alignment, so don't bend em. and just lift the hood back in place and reinstall the 7-9 hood fasteners.





Now that I had the first car, MINE done, out the way and learned from mistakes....aka don't use cheap harbor freight diamond disc cutting tools on aluminum metal.



even though it said it could be used, they didn't cut nearly as good as I would expect "diamond" to cut. so I rang up ETMX183 from Camaro5 forums, and he gave me the tip to use the dremel carbon based cutting discs. not the really thin cheaper ones that are dime size, but these are about the size of a silver dollar. this is the exact pack I bought... about 23$ at ace hardware.



After the mishap of the harbor freight gimmick, heating up, and the shaft bent to an L shape and thumped my hood, the dremel did the job 10 times quicker, cleaner, and smoother. I spent about 30 min to cut 5 inches with the harbor freight ones, and I spent about 10-15 min each for the rest of the 3 hole openings I had to cut (right side of my hood, and both for AlphaCamaro7's hood) So lesson learned. His hood though, quick, and NO CASUALTIES




Once I cut Alpha's hood, we stopped by the car wash, and cleaned up the cars. if anyone knows me, they know I wash my car less than I drive it. my car exterior is always dirty, but I use my cars. not a toy, etc. sees track time, I expect the chips, and etc. so I know if I worry about dirt and chips like some do, as much as I use my car, i'll never be happy. and if I'm not happy, I lose interest in whatever that may be. But I got my monthly wash done due to the abrasive dust needing to be cleaned off and all.






Overall, this was pretty easy to do. The one casualty I had was due to a cheap part failure, and to me, I barely notice it. i'llget the touch up paint in a few days and try it. not gonna bother me one bit though either way. my hood NOW LETS OUT HOT AIR

in the words of which I stole from Samuel L Jackson......SH*TCHYEAA!!!

That was my main goal to be honest.

I got a quote from a few places for an SS hood, which was 800$ unpainted, but shipped. paint is another 3-400$ locally for hoods, and the vents were 100$ shipped. Thank you Camar05 for the sale on the vents! But I'd still be at about 1300$ for a new SS hood, and no guarantee on color matching with the new paint, not that I care. (Once again, I'm not particular unless I ask for HBM and you give me Blue Ray Metallic.)


There's also a HBM SS hood on eBay. 499$ but local pickup about 2.4 hours from here, so I'd have to find a way to take this hood off, drive up without a hood and get that one...legally through 3 states. too much of a risk for me.

So the hood vents (100), dremel discs (23) and the cheap cutting discs (12) and a converter I needed (16)...roughly 150$

[NCSD]

WOW .. You are a brave man. It looks great good job. I'd be afraid to try that.

[Zae757]

Looks good

[chris227]

Nice job. Looking forward to the write up. Looks great.

[chris227]

So i'm guessing you just used some 3M tape to hold them down?

[PolynesianPowerhouse]

Originally Posted by NCSD

WOW .. You are a brave man. It looks great good job. I'd be afraid to try that.

appreciate it. just look at it as, its my car, if I mess up, I can always fix it

Originally Posted by Zae757

Looks good

Def Appreciate it!

Originally Posted by chris227

So i'm guessing you just used some 3M tape to hold them down?

nope, clipped right in. I'm debating on leaving em like that, or making tabs underneath to attach to the bolts, which is totally doable BTW. you'd simply use a strip of aluminum and drill a hole for the bolts on one side, and then rivet it to the underhood structure on the other side.

each vent would use 2 strips. one coming from the left side of each vent, and one coming from the right side. the same way it is on the stock SS hood. so that would be 4 strips total.

I may put some foam tape under there, like a one sided tape. we talked about the 3m tape though. apparently some have said that's how it comes from the factory. so I haven't ruled that out yet.

[chris227]

Originally Posted by PolynesianPowerhouse

nope, clipped right in. I'm debating on leaving em like that, or making tabs underneath to attach to the bolts, which is totally doable BTW. you'd simply use a strip of aluminum and drill a hole for the bolts on one side, and then rivet it to the underhood structure on the other side.

each vent would use 2 strips. one coming from the left side of each vent, and one coming from the right side. the same way it is on the stock SS hood. so that would be 4 strips total.

I may put some foam tape under there, like a one sided tape. we talked about the 3m tape though. apparently some have said that's how it comes from the factory. so I haven't ruled that out yet.

Got it. Gonna have to do this this summer. I did it on my 5th gen with the SS vent.Was curious how it would secure down since i did the what amounted to aluminium straps on my 5th. Thanks again for the great write up.

[Glen e]

That looks real nice........I know the feeling, you kinda hold you breath when cutting the hood:

[Nfg2ss]

Takes some serious balls to do that shit to your car, especially on the hood. ���� Looks awesome.

[PolynesianPowerhouse]

Originally Posted by chris227

Got it. Gonna have to do this this summer. I did it on my 5th gen with the SS vent.Was curious how it would secure down since i did the what amounted to aluminium straps on my 5th. Thanks again for the great write up.

Notta prob. Wanted to get it done so we'd know for sure it can be done.

Next goal is to ooen up the drip tray a bit

You shouldnt have any probs though. From doing it on another car itll all come back

Originally Posted by Glen e

That looks real nice........I know the feeling, you kinda hold you breath when cutting the hood:

Good stuff Glen! Yea you got that "boho pucker" moment, then the rest is easy!

Originally Posted by Nfg2ss

Takes some serious balls to do that shit to your car, especially on the hood. ���� Looks awesome.

Appreciate it. Honestly i look at it loke bakong a cake or cookin food. If you dont take your time and pay attention, then you can burn it or go wrong. Same with the hood. Just have confidence!

[Glen e]

I have cut two hoods now and if you arm yourself with one fresh bimetallic blade per opening, the hood really does cut almost like butter.....

[Michigan1LTRS]

Very nice job!!!!

[Curr]

1) This is pretty awesome in terms of DIY!
2) Where the hell do you find pants to contain your giant brass balls?!

Nice work man, really!

[Phoenix_Gilmore]

I'm about to do this to my LT. Any tips?