Door alignment question

[Lippy]

Background: I'm aware door alignment has been an issue on F-150s for quite awhile, and the panel stamping of aluminum makes the problem even harder. There are several threads on this and other forums on this topic. It is desirable to have the leading panel sit slightly proud of the panel behind it to minimize wind noise, which makes sense.

My issue: The bottom of my passenger side front door is proud of the front of the rear door by about 3/32". You can see it if you look at the lines of the truck. It sticks out and doesn't look well aligned. The door aligns better at the top of the panel. After reading up on this, I loosened the striker and tapped it inward with a wood block and mallet, and then tightened it up again. Now, the alignment is almost perfect in the spot at the bottom where it was not aligned, and the doors are aligned at the top. But the problem is that, due to the shape of the stamping, the long edge of the center section of the door now sits "lower" than the adjacent edge on the rear door. Everything looks great, but I'm wondering if I opened up a can of worms and will now hear more wind noise.

How does everyone else's alignment look (does anyone else have doors where the front one is "lower" than the rear in parts?), and do you have wind noise? Also, is there anyone more experienced than me who might have any ideas how to solve this?

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[Pedaldude]

Here’s detailed pictures of my doors:

https://www.f150gen14.com/forum/threads/fit-and-finish.1062/#post-31461

It’s not obvious when the doors are installed correctly but it is obvious when they aren’t. I noticed from ten feet away and was hoping that the doors weren’t closed properly, because that’s how it looks.

Mine are off over an 1/8th of an inch and a whistling noise is audible at highway speeds that goes away if you pull on the door.

The problem with my doors isn’t the shape of the doors or the door strike but the angle of the hinges when they are closed. It’s off by a few degrees, in that the entire door isn’t parallel with the bed or fenders. The door can be adjusted by manipulating the mounting on the two hinges as well as the strike, where it closes. So if it‘s off more at the bottom of the door than the top, you adjust the bottom hinge more. Since there’s three attachment points, it can be adjusted within reason in every dimension.

Making doors out of aluminum isn’t a problem for other manufacturers, blaming the material is just an excuse. I am currently dealing with my dealership with my misaligned doors but I am quickly losing patience. It’s like walking past a crooked picture frame everyday and to make things worse, my area has a problem with transients and drug addicts who like to rob cars and trucks. Since my doors don’t look closed when they are latched and since there’s a nice big gap, I am afraid someone may attempt to pry the door open, thinking there’s a belt buckle jammed in it and that it’s not properly latched, creating a lot of damage in the process.

Doors being hung improperly is not normal and I have been taking pictures of every single cab truck I see to take into my dealership as I build my case. To make things more frustrating, the sales team agreed that the doors were on wrong and put a promise to fix into the sales agreement. It was as soon as I started dealing with the service department that they started sandbagging and gaslighting me.

 

[Seavee33]

So how do you adjust the doors? Do you just loosen the hex bolts holding them on the hinge?

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