fincher

This happened to me 3 years ago when i got really really cold out. Basically I opened my driver side door and now it wont shut

anyone have experience with this?

grillage

I happen to have the latch off of my car right now for the same reason.

with my door if I hold the door handle open I can manually lift the latch up and the door will close (I'm pointing to the latch in the picture)



I've finally gotten tired of doing that so I'm going to take it apart and try to find the problem.

I'll keep you posted

fincher

ok thanks a lot

my guess is it is something related to the locking mechanism and temperature

CRAZY_RUSSIAN

have you tried just cleaning it and then relubing?

grillage

Im going to see if I can get the innards of the locking mechanism apart so I can do that.

the other problem I have is that the black hunks in the photo above are what's left of my rubber seal. there's nothing left. I can't imagine finding that will be easy

grillage

Has anyone ever taken one of these apart before?



I can't find anything on the Forum

I believe I have a broken spring that was working some times. I know that sounds weird but I've seen coil springs work even when they're broken just because they line up to each other

CRAZY_RUSSIAN

which ones are you talking about?
http://www.auto-parts.spb.ru/cat/au/...Vo5v4uiFKYwQ==

grillage

That's the one but I can only find it on that site and Vagcat -- unfortunately I can't find a place to actually buy it.

grillage

Well - I got it all apart -- the two cylinders where the bolt go through have a little rib on them that the plastic "cover" fits into. I had to stick a really skinny piece of metal in between the two while prying up ever so gingerly to get it to pop off.

The inside...



Indeed the spring was broken...



I had to figure out what the spring was supposed to catch on. I knew that the long side fit into the plastic cover (being able to push it out of its perch told me that there was no tension on the spring and that it was broken) so I needed to figure out where the other side went.

Once I decided on the spot with the white arrow in the below photo I tried to take the existing spring and bend it to work in the original spot. The trick was to have the spring be the right length so that I could wind it up enough to work (in the direction of the yellow arrow). I totally guessed and I think it is about right.



Here's what everything looked like when I went to put it all back together...



The really really hard part was putting it back together while seating the spring in the right place. I finally got it on the twentieth try or so.

Ta Dah!