98 Rav4 Hood not shutting all the way(latch issue)

[chrisp]

Hello Everyone

There are two latches for the hood on my 98 rav4.

The outer latch to the hood that keeps the hood from coming up. You have to reach under the hood and lift a knob to undo it.

The other latch is undone by lifting a switch below your steering wheel. This is my issue I cannot get the hood to lock when i shut it. It comes up and is only stopped by the outer latch.

How hard is this to fix?

Thank you

[mozz78]

should be reasonably easy, loosen the two torx bolts on the catch and raise it slightly, try bonnet lift a small amount at a time until it closes appropriately, once you've done this adjust the two rubber stops at th front corners of the bonnet to prevent it 'rocking' hope this helps :-) and then give the catch a good squirt of wd40 or any thin freeing oil.

[JuneBug]

Maybe there is a broken spring preventing it from latching? Be careful when testing--you could be in a jam if the hood were to latch and the inside release handle had no effect. Perhaps you could use a screwdriver shank of the right diameter to test the latch.