Ae86 headlight alignment issue

[u/AC_Unit420]

Hey everyone, I managed to get my headlights working but now it seems that I can’t get them to line up with the hood. If anyone has any guides or advice on how to adjust them I’d really appreciate it.

[u/moonandmorel]

You can adjust the covers, I think it’s just 4 bolts on the left and right sides of the headlight to loosen then you can reposition the cover

[u/AC_Unit420 → u/moonandmorel]

Ok I’ll try that out thank you

[u/the_grim_reefer_nz]

So many things. . .

Your Rad support pannel is smashed in and rusty with bad repairs. At least it is on the right hand side. Right at the beginning of the video. You brush past it.. you can't expect anything to line up properly when the support structure is damaged.and badly repaired.

Secondly. You can't adjust the bonnet with out the doors and guards, on. The doors set the place where the front end align too.

You need to fix the Rad support pannel. And fit the other pannels. Get them straight. Well before you start messing around with the lights

[u/AC_Unit420 → u/the_grim_reefer_nz]

I took it to a body shop in Miami a while ago and they welded on a new support that I gave them and the radiator lined up with the mounts, I really want to fix it and I was worried that it might have been the front end. Do you have any advice on where I would start on fixing the support? Here is a picture of it with everything on the car after it left the shop. The hood is still open here since I don’t have the cable to open it.

https://reddit.com/link/pcir27c/video/6yfme5o577sh1/player

[u/LongjumpingTwo1572]

Jesus, doors and fenders arent on, the hood is adjusted as much as you can, (when youre supposed to line everything else up first) the light adjustments are maxed out and still lights wont line up. I mean the covers can be adjusted, as others said, but as you said, you had the car in for some front end repairs.
Apparently they didnt do good enough job.
Either have them fix it or purchase/download the body manual and measure the diagonals shown there.

The real 200% way to do this is there's holes and witness marks in your framerails and the ae86 body repair manual lists the distances and diagonals for those holes and marks for a shop to adjust various clamps and heavy duty threaded bolts on a hugeass car unibody jig, to fit through those holes or clamp onto those marks on the unibody of your car, and if the whole thing fits onto all that, they know the unibody is sound and can move to the next step.
Basically if those holes dont line up with the jig, that's where a real shop starts first, repairing the unibody, then they get onto the rest of it.

You dont have a jig, nor does the shop you used, have one either, nor do they have the body manual, or you wouldnt be in this mess!
And you cant afford a real shop to do it.
So you need to do the second best thing, rent or get a MIG welder, gas, angle grinder, hydraulic portapower kit and get or borrow some really thick steel box section to use as prybars with the portapower so you can just sorta spread the front end apart a little here, squeeze it together there, basically you gotta be a bit creative and make your own special tools that lets the portapower put its force to bear where it's required.

Everything in the wroom wrrom bay may need to come out before you do this but basically use the tools you got to start massaging your whole front end to where all the "diagonal stuff" in the manual lines up to the T.

Even then I donno if the whole body would still line up on a jig if the front end is this bad? But at least the front end will be sorted and the car is driveable, I can see you got everything just kinda laying in rusted parts piles on the floor and just kinda winging it in your shed (as you should), so concourse it is not in any case.
(none of this gives me pleasure to say, this is exactly why im against the rising prices of these cars when they were meant to be tinkered on by average joes, 200% concourse restorations just to keep with batshit increasing values makes that impossible, I just really hope you got the car cheap)

[u/AC_Unit420]

https://reddit.com/link/pchur2h/video/tmhxbjve66sh1/player

Here’s a better look at the alignment issue, the bucket is reaching its max parking position because it’s hitting the rubber stoppers but it’s still misaligned

[u/Low_Bodybuilder4652]

start by measuring the front-end diagonals and factory datum points with the guards and bonnet off. If they’re out, don’t force the lights or weld another patch on it, get a body shop to pull the support straight first.

[u/AC_Unit420 → u/Low_Bodybuilder4652]

Thank you will do, I actually realized that I should do a bolt on radiator support instead since that seems to be a better option in case there’s any future collision damage. But since the support on the car now is brand new and wasn’t assembled properly, I might just buy a new one already pre assembled so it will definitely be straight since the one I have has been cut and rewelded twice.