1998 Dakota SLT. Sometimes the hood latch will not completely release the hood so the lever in the grille won't release the hood totally. You can slam the hood down some and go back to the cab and pull the hood release and the hood then can be raised. Other times it takes one person in the cab pulling the hood lever and another at the hood pulling on the hood release lever in the grille. How do I fix this so I can reliably get the hood open without needing two people or needing to close the hood entirely and pull the hood lever in the cab again? Is lubrication the answer? I understand this is a known problem with the '98 Dakota's.
This may not be applicable but:
several years ago my GMC was sitting idle quite a bit of the time & about the only time I was raising the hood was to change the oil (which wasn't that often because I was barely driving it at the time). I remember a time when I pulled the hood release lever in the cab & nothing would happen. I did the same as you to get it open & then I lubed the crap out of everything I could get a lube can on & opened it & closed it multiple times. That was a different time in my life & I had bigger fish to fry than keeping up on my vehicles. Now a days I make sure that I periodically open & close my hood on everything I own. I have not had that issue with my GMC since that one period in its life.
I will add quickly that my Dak is an '03 which I acquired in '14 & I am relatively confident that the previous owner didn't get under that hood very often, & the hood latch on THAT truck has NEVER failed to operate. So who knows. I don't drive a whole lot any more so that means I have more time to spend on upkeep, & remembering what went down on my GMC back then, I have well lubed everything on the cables & latches & hinges of all three of my pickups & I give the hood latches/hinges some exercise on a periodic basis. I would suggest that you lubricate everything that can be lubed & then cycle the hood a bunch. As far as what you are supposed to lube it with, I don't know for sure. When my GMC latch first failed to operate, I used WD40 because that was what I had on hand. Since then I picked up some of this white foamy lithium grease in a spray can & I spray bombed EVERYTHING on all of my trucks with that.
Not that I am saying that's what you are supposed to use; that just happened to be what I decided to go with.
I will add quickly that my Dak is an '03 which I acquired in '14 & I am relatively confident that the previous owner didn't get under that hood very often, & the hood latch on THAT truck has NEVER failed to operate. So who knows. I don't drive a whole lot any more so that means I have more time to spend on upkeep, & remembering what went down on my GMC back then, I have well lubed everything on the cables & latches & hinges of all three of my pickups & I give the hood latches/hinges some exercise on a periodic basis. I would suggest that you lubricate everything that can be lubed & then cycle the hood a bunch. As far as what you are supposed to lube it with, I don't know for sure. When my GMC latch first failed to operate, I used WD40 because that was what I had on hand. Since then I picked up some of this white foamy lithium grease in a spray can & I spray bombed EVERYTHING on all of my trucks with that.
Not that I am saying that's what you are supposed to use; that just happened to be what I decided to go with.
The guy I bought it from said he'd never been under the hood! I'm guessing this situation is very much like the one you had.
It just so happens I've got some white lithium grease I had for another reason! I think I'm going to brush off some of the (surface) rust and hit the latch (and hinges) with that. Hopefully that will take care of the problem.
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