Opening hood with a billet grille?

[chrisrace24]

how do u open the hood with the grille in place

 

[section525]

how do u open the hood with the grille in place

When I had the billet grille in my '96 I used a flat head screwdriver. You can actually get pretty good at it. :

The '98-01 Explorers had the hood latches between the top of the grille and the hood. So they lucked out. You can convert over to that type of latch as well. A couple members are in the process of doing it right now.

 

[dislexiclawyer]

When I had the billet grille in my '96 I used a flat head screwdriver. You can actually get pretty good at it. :

Most times I can just fit a finger in one of the openings to hit the latch, but a screwdriver would work fine too. I forget who it is but someone on the forum rigged up a cable to go through the little plastic cover above the grill so that after the hood was popped he could just pull the cable to release the hood. Ill see if I can't find who it was.....hopefully they see the thread and post

 

[Four0Sport]

a screwdriver or changing the latch when using one of the thin tight billet grilles is the best way.. luckily my grille used larger square tubes and are spaced apart so i can still fit my hands through.

 

[toypaseo]

Here is a thread on changing the hood latch...

http://www.explorerforum.com/forums/showthread.php?t=225695&highlight=latch

 

[dislexiclawyer]

Thank you! FireZapper is the one who used the cable.

I put in a wire mesh to protect the grill offroad.

I took a wire and attached it to the latch.
Then made a loop to grab just when the hood is open.

 

[blueka]

I changed my hood latch to the 98 onwards spec, with the latch under the hood, not under the grille, took about 10 mins to do all in all...

I've still not found a grille i like yet though...

Si

 

[BrianDye]

my billet grill came with an extended arm to mount so i could still open the hood