So I had to push my car into the garage a week or so ago and while pushing it backward to point it towards the garage door, I caught the driver's door on a dirt berm. This hyperextend the hinge and caught the edge of the fender. Now the door sits slightly further back in the frame and the fender is pretty well crinkled. I'm guessing the door fittment (or lack thereof) means the hinge is tweaked. Frome what I've read, getting the fenders off is kind of a pain in the ***, but I'm sure I can manage. What I'm more concerned about is the hinge. I feel like this is harder to fix than to replace, but finding a replacement hinge doesn't seem to be that easy either. What are my options here? Should I shell out the cash to take it to a bodyshop?

 

Finding a door hinge should be pretty easily actually - just ask someone parting out a car right before it goes to the scrapper and grab a hinge from them. It probably is near impossible to fix the hinge, that's just my thought.

 

Can you pull the door and look at how it is damaged?

I would think that the metal that the hinge bolts to is tweaked...making it more difficult than just a replacement hinge.

 

Theres an upper and lower. I have 2 spare doors (L/R) so PM me if you want the hinges

 

I did this same thing to mine literally 25 years ago. I drove without a fender for a long time. Take heart, it can be fixed. A new hinge and a good body shop is what you need. The damage extends beyond just the hinge. You would never know now that happened to mine. Good luck.

 

Yeah, that's a worry of mine. I'm gonna take a look here in a bit.

 

Cool, I'm glad to know that its repairable.

 

So, I can't for the life of me figure out how to get this fender off. There doesn't seem to be anything in the body shop repair manual about it, and some searching on here hasn't yeilded anything either. Maybe I'm just incompetent, but can someone give me some guidance?

 

Bumper clips on to the front, prob better to just remove bumper as well. Some bolts under hood area / top of fender. One inside the door opening area, two underneath by rocker panel, and one or two connecting to lower valence area. There might be one hiding inside the headlight area too. I forget it's been awhile.

 

& a bunch of hard-as-a-rock sealant.

 

I work at a body shop, you can tweak the hinges back. All you have to do is get a block of wood and open the door, put the block of wood Where the hinges are and close the door. When you feel the door catch on the wood, push on it a couple of times, that will tweak it back.do that one hinge at a time until you have a good gap.if you move it to far, all you do is open the door alocks the way and flex it a little more

 

May not need to remove the bumper. There is also a 12mm (I think) bolt that you have to loosen, not remove, between the two hinges, located just above the bottom hinge (see pic below from my 79). There is a tang installed on the door hinge pillar between the two hinges that a corresponding tab on the fender bolts onto. Loosen that bolt enough to remove the fender tab from the pillar tang after you've removed the top bolts and the bottom bolts along the rocker.

 

If it comes to it, looks like this guy on ebay has hinges for you. Tons of FB parts..

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Mazda-RX-7-RX7-Door-Hinge-Set-1979-1985-Choice-of-RT-or-Lft-Side-84-83-82-81-/160814112075?pt=Motors_Car_Truck_Parts_Accessories&hash=item2571449d4b