Hood lift supports

[dwhitty]

I have noticed that when the hood lift supports are disconnected they seem to lock up and no longer function as they should. Do they need to be replaced whenever they are removed? 1993 Q45

[elwesso]

Are you talking about the hood struts? if so you can get a new pair from autozone for like $15

[rsiwicki]

believe it or not....you can't compress the hood supports by hand. that is if they are functioning correctly. I just installed new supports several months ago and thought something was wrong when I could not even compress the damn thing a tiny amount. I put it on and it worked fine...then I read the instructions and it says that no human can compress the strut by bare hands....well maybe a WWE dude or Arnold could maybe move it a tad

[Aus94Q45]

Watch out on the aftermarkets. The clearance at the firewall is very tight. The non-OEM's must have the exact shape of the OEMs. If not you will waste an hour only to find that you cannot close your hood!

[JedCoop]

I measured the holding power of my hood struts by putting one end on a bathroom scale and leaning on them with my body weight. The scale read about 88 pounds to start them compressing. That dropped to about 82 pounds as they were compressing slowly.

The bad ones I removed compressed at about 65 pounds.

[5zigen]

Dang, I wonder how heavy the hood is.