When I went to get a new hood fitted I was provided with a lesson from Charlie the trim shop foreman especially for hoods on 4 seaters.

  1.Take off the rear sidescreen. Stretching the hood over the sidesceen as you put it up can  cause the hood to split (now he tells me)
  2.Then erect the frame.
  3.Put the hood over the frame and do up the twist fasteners on the back
  4.Now connect the "lift the dot" nearest the windscreen centre
  5.Then the second one in from the edge
  6.Do all the others on that side
  7.Repeat 4-6 on the other side
  8.Finally install the rear sidescreens making sure they are inside the flap provided and do up  the poppers.
  9.Climb inside and close the door, make sure the sidescreen is under the flap or they bend out at speed.
 10.Finally; since the whole process takes several minutes and the weather has been making like a  monsoon all that time even though Michael Fish swore that it would be a dry day, dry yourself off with the towel you keep for the purpose (Charlie didn't include that one).

If you don't want the hood to split you have 2 possible courses of action:

  1.Don't use it
  2.Never take it off!!

Finally warm hoods erect far more easily. Most of the damage to my old one, including the final catastrophe, occurred in winter when forced to use pliers to enhance the available grip. Some owners have even split the windscreen erecting a tight hood. If travelling on your own keep the hood in the passenger footwell, there is enough heat to make it reasonably easy where there is a heater, and enough from the engine where there is no heater to make it at least easier to erect (Making the wife/girlfriend/husband/boyfriend travel in the back to make room for the hood is not usually well received). If at home bring the hood inside and put it in the airing cupboard for a couple of hours before fitting. 

Hoods on 2 Seaters Classic Morgan 'til the end of 2001
by Lorne Goldman September 2015

I regularly get asked how to put on the hood stays and how to run their straps. I promptly run out to my nearest Morgan to double check. I then answer the person asking and I promise myself to write a GoMoG article which, just as promptly, I forget to do. This has been going on for 20 GoMoG years.

This time my Morgan is 5500 miles away. We are in South America until next June. So I guess it is time to write the article once and for all! This has become increasingly important as the new bunch at the factory stopped using the traditional hood in 2001 and switched to more modern nonsense which leaks as badly as the hoods did 20 years earlier! It took them 60 years to get the old vintage hood leak free, so I imagine it will take them the same time to get the new type leakless. Aside from these much more modern leaks, the current system prevents sidescreen and hood storage within the car and cuts the sublime Morgan profile by adding a rumpled hump when the hood is down during best driving days. (enough ranting! Get on with it Lorne!)

THE STAYS

The first task is to figure out how the hoods stays fit. This is easy. Each stay is shaped in a fashion that makes their order of fitting simple to fathom. Just in case, look at the pictures of the stays to the side here. Rear stay (when up) is fit the most outboard. The most forward stay when up, the one closest to the windscreen, is the one fit between the other two.   er...wasn't that simple?

 
THE STRAPS

Now here is where life gets complicated. (evil smile)  The sequence of the stays when up determine the sequence the straps are attached when up as well!  The straps are attacked at the top of the rear deck, travel to the most inboard stay (when down) then to the most outboard stay (when down) and then to the middle stay. The proper way to measure the straps is to install the hood with the stays down and no straps, put up the stays and position them in the proper sequence (described above), adjust them until the hood looks its best, and then measure the distance between the rear deck fitting point, then the next upright stay (which is the forward stay when down and the middle one when up) at its top then on to the front stay (which is tthe middle one when down.

You will have to add a bit to reflect the fact that the strap circles each stay. I also stressed the fact the the measurement must be at the top of the stay as you want to make your seams at the top of the stays so as to give you a smooth hood rather than one which shows the stays like protruding ribs.

Yes, this sounds a little involved. It isn't. AND it is nothing the ladies won't be able to understand instantly and sew. They can visualize better than men. Please send me feedback after trying these instructions and suggest any corrections or improvements to make it clearer.

A SMOOTH HOOD
by Lorne Goldman

Many owners of older Morgans complain that the newer hoods fit more tightly and attractively than theirs. Admittedly, Steve Simmonds,  pushed Morgan hood lore further forward than at any time since HFS. Many of his ideas are now part of the current production and there is, to some extent, greater care is taken.  But the primary difference in looks is caused by materiel wear. In a nutshell, they all stretch (and shrink) over time  and look less attractive and lumpy as time passes. It is difficult to re-tailor what you have as the stretching takes place everywhere on the hood and it is easy to butcher what you have in an effort to make it look more trim.

However, there are tricks.

The first of these is the Morgan Hood Swivels. These items are designed to assist raisng and lowering the hood. However, ever they can also serve another two benefits that are unmentioned.

1. They can, to a degree, re-tension an older stretched hood. I have often wished they had an adjustment feature to better serve this purpose.

2. They can cut out a LOT of time when putting the vintage hoods up or down.

FOAM

There is another simple method of smoothing the hood. It came to me after Audrey wacked her head once on one of the hood stays. (I was instantly blamed.) So I stopped at the next hardware store and purchased some pipe installation. This is made of foam sold in 3-4 different diameters. It is inexpensive and can be easily cut to fit around the hood stays and straps. It idly cushions the stay and protected my beloved's head. It also shaped the 15 year old mohair hood on the Plus 8 we were driving until it looked like a Simmond's work of art.

It was seen by others who adopted the idea for that purpose, and they covered the foam with the cloth of their choice!

RAISING THE HOOD QUICKLY
by Lorne Goldman

i. Remove the tonneau, (If there is a big risk of rain, we leave the full hood down, folder into the rear compartment, with the front two side fittings off. This leaves the hood at the ready and does NOT change the profile of the car. You can even cover the fit hood with the tonneau, but if you are into speed of installation, don't.

ii. Attach the hood to the windscreen.

iii. Pull up the hood stays by the middle (when prone) stay.

iv. Adjust the straps evenly.

v. Use the hood swivels to tension the hood.