Thread: defender door problems

Originally Posted by spudboy

Well when I pulled it out I thought I was just going to buy a new one

Whaaa?? So is that why you got a new 'Fender? The inner door cavity was dirty???

Originally Posted by Aaron

Couldn't you have just air compressed the sand out?

Those clips are bad. Im seriously going to set up some sort of captive nuts on the door frame and screw the panels on with some sort of nice looking stainless fastener. Would be cool to have a sort of cam lock arrangement also... or the same set up the radiator shroud has.

the radiator shroud is held on by "Dzuz Fasteners" you can get them from any european motorcycle dealership, thanks for the idea.

Originally Posted by crump

thanks for the idea.

no no! thankyou!
keep me posted!

Sounds like the best thing to do will be strip the door down and inspect and clean the lock. Is there anything tricky in removing the door trim?

not reallllly. just those clips on the door will break. you *will* break one or two, buts its not really an issue until you have like only two clips left heh.

You will need to take the inside door handle off and the door latch thing (the plastic concave thing behind the latch handle).

Then slowly work around the door trim pulling the door trim back until the clips let loose. top left and bottom right hand corner have two big clips vissible from the outside which will need to lever up with something flat (screwdriver). once those are free peel the trim back a tad and shine a torch to see the clips and you will see how it all works

Once you have the trim off you will be confronted with a plastic sheet stuck to the door with black goo. pull the plastic off and cut all the stretchy cheesey bits to stop them going every - thats optional, depends how neat you want to work.

then you will be faced with the door lock this is where i let you run free .

to put the door back together reverses the previous procedures basically.

check to see that none of the black clips are stuck in the white retainers on the door, if so get a flat object and using your finger as a fulcrum, lever them out and put them on the door panel. line up all the clips with the white retainers and starting from the top snap the pins back into place. screw both your door handles on, and clip the doork lock shroud thing in (hard to explain this bit, but you will see it when it comes time to doing it.)

if you go nuts with the spray lube, avoid getting it on the black goo stuff, or it wont let the plastic stick to it. If you do, get a bit of degreeser on a cloth and wipe up the excess.

Ill be home all day tomorrow, ill pm you my phone number, text me to tell me to get my **** online if you need anymore help.

oh yeah... the door lock shroud things snap pretty easy, if you do, dont panic, ive got some spares i can post you.

Oh, before you do all that. Have a look at your door striker (thing the door latches onto on the pillar) and see if you can see if it has moved. You will be able to tell that buy paint scratching etc. If so, move it back into place and test the door. Hopefully it is only the striker and you dont have to screw around with the door lock.

I finally gave up and took it back to the dealer and they replaced a spring that was either broken or faulty and no problems since. Closes without any effort whatsoever which tells me this was a problem from new and I should have got fixed under warranty. Too late she cried.