Can't open front hood Help !

[cow bay porsche]

Hello from Nova Scotia,

I'm new to the forum and can't open the front hood of my 2000 Boxster S.
The hood wouldn't open yesterday, and when I pulled a couple of times on the lever the cable broke ( didn't force it )
I pulled the cable housing apart and cut back the outer cable and tried wrapping the inner cable 'round a pair of vice grips to pull, but no luck.
I finally located the emergency pull which was hiding in the passenger headlight housing and pulled on that, but it still won't open.
You can hear a slight clicking like it is trying to release but it doesn't. I've tried pushing up and down on the hood while pulling on the emergency cable etc, but it won't budge.
Also tried dropping the RH rad to try to get at the 3 headlight nuts attaching the headlight to the headlight frame but it's hard to get at the front ones, and then the knurled nuts, and i'm not sure if I can pull the headlight out backwards towards the wheel anyway ?

Any ideas, other than a recip saw ???

Cheers! Alan

[harryrcb]

Originally Posted by cow bay porsche

Hello from Nova Scotia,

I'm new to the forum and can't open the front hood of my 2000 Boxster S.
The hood wouldn't open yesterday, and when I pulled a couple of times on the lever the cable broke ( didn't force it )
I pulled the cable housing apart and cut back the outer cable and tried wrapping the inner cable 'round a pair of vice grips to pull, but no luck.
I finally located the emergency pull which was hiding in the passenger headlight housing and pulled on that, but it still won't open.
You can hear a slight clicking like it is trying to release but it doesn't. I've tried pushing up and down on the hood while pulling on the emergency cable etc, but it won't budge.
Also tried dropping the RH rad to try to get at the 3 headlight nuts attaching the headlight to the headlight frame but it's hard to get at the front ones, and then the knurled nuts, and i'm not sure if I can pull the headlight out backward toward the wheel anyway ?

Any ideas, other than a recip saw ???

Cheers! Alan

Sounds like you have done everything possible, I know for sure you can't pull the headlight out in that direction without destroying it. I think your idea of saws-all is probably your only other option. just protect the bumper cover with a couple layers of tape and the edge of your hood.
Before you do that there are 4 holes in the bottom of the frunk that have sealer on them, I don't know for sure if they pop out or not. It's worth a try then you can get to the 2 10 mm bolts that hold the lock.
Good luck
Harry

[cow bay porsche]

Thanks Harry.............. Your good luck worked !

I spent last night wondering how I was going to get in with a recip saw without doing thousands of dollars worth of damage.
I threw it back together this morning and decided to go to a friend's body shop before going to see Porsche, to see if they had any suggestions / experience.
I talked to my friend Anthony and he said there's no way in, we then went outside to the car and I pulled on the emergency cable, ( i'd attached a large tie wrap so I could pull it with the wheel on and the inner fender off ) while he BEAT on the emblem of the hood and it popped open in 10 secs.
I had my wife do this yesterday, but she obviously isn't as strong as Anthony.
We then realized that the cam on the latch was only opening a tiny amount, so we tried closing the cam ( latching ) with a screwdriver, the cable still wouldn't open it.
I doused it with penetrating oil but still no luck. So I then tie wrapped the hood U catch to the latch and left it open with the safety catch on, and drove home.
When I got home I looked at the latch carefully and the closing cam looked very close to the latch housing, so I pushed a small flathead screwdriver between and open the gap a little, this worked fine and the cam moved its full distance when pulling on the cable.
Have no idea how the latch and the housing got squeezed together ! but it's something i'm going to check on occasionally.
Now that it is working fine I removed the passenger headlight and routed the emergency cable through the tow bolt hole and attached a large tie wrap on the end so I don't loose it down the hole.
Just have to get a new cable for the levers now and put on the passenger inner fender.............. then back to having fun !
Cheers! Alan

[Zeke]

Great idea on rerouting the emer cable. (I think)