LegacyZ

1980 280 ZX with manual locks.

So the driver's side was having issues unlocking from outside and after pulling the panel, I found that this adjustable piece was just not pushing down far enough to line everything up, so i cut a tiny section of hose, and used it as a spacer.

(hose is black sandwiched between the "white" (now kinda yellowed) plastic bits.. The top plastic piece looks like it's threaded on, so I could probably achieve the same result by spinning it, but I can't reach my fingers in there and am worried about breaking brittle plastic..

That worked great for getting everything to line up where the screwdriver is pointing here:


Now, when you lock the door from inside, and try to unlock it, the pivoting piece just under the screwdriver tip in the 2nd picture doesn't pivot far enough, so the tab the screwdriver is pointing at hits it and won't let the door unlock. The pivoting piece rests on another piece behind the foreground rod in that pic, and I thought of trying to pad that a bit so the pivot stop will happen sooner, but i can't get anything to stay in place..

I know I'm essentially ghetto-rigging a ghetto-rig. Who else has had this problem and how have you fixed it? I've been looking for new internals but coming up empty. I don't want to spend a fortune buying some NOS or scavenging from somewhere since I'm assuming this whole chunk of mechanics won't be cheap..

Any help would be great!

LegacyZ

For reference, it was stuck when I pointed the screwdriver at it, this is what it looks like when it's allowed to swing back to proper unlocked position:

zxguy1986

I think your improvised 'repair' is pretty good, clever even. Custom parts get unavailable over the years and there is little else you can do about it. My solution is always a recycling yard. I found whole Zs sitting there and the yard is always happy to sell a whole door, window, gaskets and all. There you would find your parts - but I see you are opposed to the idea. If you get un-opposed, at least check the yards out in your area. Car-Part.com--Used Auto Parts Market and search for a common part like engine or transmission, sorting the results by your zip code. That shows you where the yards are in your area. You can call to see if they have a good body on the lot and go take a look at it. That has been my gold mine for Z parts, anyway. Old Hondas, too.

Agree about that old plastic stuff. It just shatters when you try to work with it. Avoid.

LegacyZ

Thanks for the compliment on the first fix, I was kinda proud of that myself :P

I'm not totally opposed if I can find a yard that's reasonable.. Sometimes they people selling know they've got a hot commodity and I don't want to spend more than $5 or $10 bucks for an old door lock mechanism..

I'm just wondering if the first fix is what caused the second problem and if my idea for a second fix would work if i can get something to stay in place.. it seems reasonable in my mind, but I know that once my McGyver blood gets flowing I sometimes wind up going 40 yards out of the way when someone else already figured out a 5 yard fix ya know?

LegacyZ

So I ghetto rigged the ghetto rigging about two weeks ago.. didn't think to take pics during the work, will do that when i do the passenger door, but for now the kid can get in and out ok..

figured i'd try and explain the "fix" in case anyone else finds this because they are having the same problem...

Sorry for the shitty cell phone screenshot, having issues logging into photobucket on my computer..



The red outline marks where that tab extends behind the threaded rod. the problem i was having was that it was rotating too far counterclockwise, and blocking the unlock mechanism from engaging it. basically, once you looked the door, you couldn't unlock it.

so I grabbed these rubber caps I bought to block off vent lines on my beetle's gas tank when i removed all the EGR/charcoal canister BS..:



wrapped a section of the one on the top right with a section of this stuff:



so that it looked like this:



and slid it over the end of that tab. that gave it enough room so that you can still lock the door, but that piece won't rotate far enough to block the mechanism from unlocking.. so far it's working fine..

beg3yrs

That's creative!