My passenger door outside latch has been non-op since I bought the car. I dug into it yesterday to get it back in service. I sucessfully repaired the damaged fork on the flapper handle. The latch mechanism in the door functions properly now. The problem is that when the door is closed, the force required to open is so high the latch is going to fail again if used in this condition. If I apply some pressure against the outside of the door the latch can be opened with the correct amount of effort. So, I thought the striker in the door-jam just needed to be adjusted out a little. Probelm is that it's already at the end of it's travel.

Any ideas? I don't know if this is something else to adjust that I'm not seeing, or what. I'll keep at it, but thought I'd check with you guys in the mean time. I've got autocross school next week and need the passenger door to work. Thanks much.

-Ben M.

The striker needs to go outward some. Try to tap it outward with a hammer and screwdriver. It may seem to be all the way out, but dirt that is built up behind the striker can make it stick. Keeping the inside of the door latch lubed is the most common cause of doors not closing properly. Remove the doorskin and spray silicone or WD-40 on it while working it.

Sounds like you have good seals on your doors. The seals will apply pressure outwards and make it hard to open unless you counteract that force by pushing in on the door.

Do you have new seals?

Thanks for the tips so far. I've loosened the striker plate enough to see that the screws are all the way against the end of the slots. The stiker plate wont move any further unless I take the plate off and 'remove some matterial'. The seals are not new. I thought that might also be part of the problem - maybe they are so stiff that they won't compress enough. That doesn't seem logical though because the door is always closed and they should have hardened and shrunk causing less pressure on the door rather than more.

Thanks guys. I'll work on it some more and check back in a while.

-Ben M.

Move the striker plate downward as well. That will keep the door from closing as tightly.

How are your gaps Ben? Are the sills sagging at all?

Okay, I'm back. All fixed! Thanks for the help - everyone. Nope Gint, no sagging. As I investigated further I found that the latching mechanism in the door would bind up solid if there was any force applied to the fork that rotates around the striker post. Earlier when I said the latch was in good working order I should have said the door-handle mechanism - not necessarily the latching mechanism. So I pulled it all out and cleaned all the grime off. (excuse me as I continue to randomly assign names to parts based soley on my own limited vocabulary...) When the door is latched a pawl engages a ratchet wheel. If you know guns it looks like a sear engaging a hammer or firing pin. I found that the interface between this pawl and it's notch was so badly galled that the ratchet actually hooked into the pawl locking them together. If force was applied to the ratchet wheel (such as would be the case when the door is closed) it was physically impossible to actuate the latch. The two parts were designed to slide apart but the harder ratchet wheel had dug into the softer pawl over time. I used a jewlers file to restore the pawl to it's correct shape and polished it to 600 grit. At this point, even before lubing it worked like new again. I greased it up and put it all back together and it works great. The door opens and closes like a dream now. It was a nice way to end the weekend. Thanks again everyone for the tips and suggestions.

-Ben M.