Stetam
New member
The one side of my 04 viper hood is misaligned with the belly pan. Is there any way of realigning the belly pan to the hood? 
FJViper
New member
Without having my sled in front of me, hard to say. Are the brackets for the hinges tweaked at all? Maybe one is out of whack. How much is it out of alignment? A pic would help.
snoprokidf6
Member
is it near the contour of the hood, where it starts to curved down towards the ground (near "r" in the sxviper decal on the right side) if so there isn't much to do if the cowl has already had the recall done to trim the bracket that holds the cowl in place
Stetam
New member
Here's a pic. All brackets all seem to be straight. Seem's like the belly pan is warped.
There are 2 bare aluminum braces below your exhaust pipe in front that attach to the front side of the bracket where the radius rods connect to the bulkhead. With the radius rods installed this ties the whole front end to the bulkhead. At their top end, these braces hold a front hoop which holds the bumper and the front of belly pan. This hoop is the part that the hood hinges are attached to. At the rear of the belly pan there is a steering gate, an inverted "U" shaped bar that the belly pan is attached to where the hood straps attach. In between the front and back the belly pan is riveted to the frame in numerous places.
I am guessing that something got bent up front or with the steering gate or front of the tunnel where the footrests are. That said in '02 there was a tech bulletin (see it in the Tech section) that involved cutting the belly pan. Yours is a newer model which already had the fix or has already been cut as can be seen in your picture.
This bulletin was a bit of a band-aid if you will, because even small jumps or rough trail would cause the belly pan to pop out from under the hood. I cut mine according to the bulletin, but it still pops out.
What many have done is simply add hood straps right where yours has come apart.
You can see the little white mark on the hood where it has been gouged by the belly pan. Yours is mild, mine is major.
You might be able to pull the belly pan from the front and back and get it to pull closer to the sled which will help the hood rest on it, but it will likely come back over time. I had my complete sled torn down to swap tunnels and I pulled this as tight as possible. It worked for about a year, but I do jump it a bit and make some rough landings once in a while.
I am guessing that something got bent up front or with the steering gate or front of the tunnel where the footrests are. That said in '02 there was a tech bulletin (see it in the Tech section) that involved cutting the belly pan. Yours is a newer model which already had the fix or has already been cut as can be seen in your picture.
This bulletin was a bit of a band-aid if you will, because even small jumps or rough trail would cause the belly pan to pop out from under the hood. I cut mine according to the bulletin, but it still pops out.
What many have done is simply add hood straps right where yours has come apart.
You can see the little white mark on the hood where it has been gouged by the belly pan. Yours is mild, mine is major.
You might be able to pull the belly pan from the front and back and get it to pull closer to the sled which will help the hood rest on it, but it will likely come back over time. I had my complete sled torn down to swap tunnels and I pulled this as tight as possible. It worked for about a year, but I do jump it a bit and make some rough landings once in a while.
I had an issue with that on my '02 Viper in the beginning of the season, but I noticed that the large headed rivets that are behind the shock/springs, that attach the belly pan to the bulkhead were snapped, or the rivets were loose, allowing the belly pan to "slouch" down a bit. After I re-riveted all the plastic, everything was good to go. I would definately check all the rivets underneath and near the shock towers that go thru the belly pans.
Stetam
New member
Thanks for all the tips! I will check it out.