Pre-1974 door on post-1974 body (1 Viewer)

[Wncarper]

Hi all, I’m new here and have tried to search this topic with no luck. I have an October 74 fj40 that I bought with a bestop softy and soft doors. I picked up a hard top and hard doors from a Facebook seller. The hard top went on without too much trouble but my doors, which are the two glass panel “bugcatcher” versión appear offset about an inch to the rear of the vehicle and don’t achieve the proper angle to shut. I am assuming that this might mean my transition year body came with the later style single panel window but don’t have access to this style door right now to test my theory.
Have other people found similar issues when mis-matching doors? Is there a documented solution, ie: changing the hinges?

Thank you for any sage wisdom, I’d love to be able to use this equipment if at all possible!

 

[brian]

Not sure what you mean by transition year...a 74 is 74.
The doors are all the same size. Hinges are the same as well.
There are issues with the strikers..74 and older vs 75 and newer. Same with the limiter.

 

[Wncarper]

Thank you for the response Brian.

My strikers seem to line up which makes me feel more confident that these are the proper doors for my year, but I’m baffled by the fit issue either way. I’ll add pics when I can get them but again, the door rests too far back to close - the body of the door in front of the hinge hits the seam line of the tub and hard top alike. It’s significantly more displacement than can be accounted for by the adjustability in the hinge. I’m confident I could do some cutting and fabrication to solve the issue but prefer not to if anyone has seen this before and has a solution.

 

[jim land]

I dont understand this part , (body of the door in front of the hinge )
We need pics

 

[oregon fj]

Yup, we need pics of the hinges. Something is not right there.

 

[Living in the Past]

Early bug catcher doors the door header was different. Possibly slightly different angle on the windshield as well. I have some of these doors but never mixed with the mid sixties to 75 models. Used the later 75+ on late sixties to mid seventies and only had to deal with the latch. Personally would not run early bug catcher vent window doors on anything but a early cruiser. The design of the one piece 75+ doors is superior to the two piece doors. Just to bad Toyota deleted the vent window in the North America market.

 

[Wncarper]

All;
Turns out I was hung up on thinking my doors were somehow wrong and missed the real problem. Knowing all doors and hinges are essentially the same (thanks Brian) prompted me to look deeper and realize my hinges were badly bent in on the side I was trying to install my first door. They had been painted over in that condition and didn’t effect the use of bestop soft doors due to their flexibility so I didn’t notice this until pulling the hinges out and comparing to the other side. I’m on my way to having it sorted out, thank you all for the help!

 

[Wncarper]

I dont understand this part , (body of the door in front of the hinge )
We need pics

I misspoke, I meant to say “body of the door in front of the latch”
I went to snap a few pics but ended up discovering my hinges were badly bent in the process, so the problem is at least on its way to being fixed. Full explanation below. Thanks Sir!