I just found a new NOS driver side door handle cup for my car on eBay. I installed it but found that the door "release" has apparently worn/stretched over the course of 200k miles and will hit the door handle cup. This will not allow the door to open. Before I dive into it, has anyone ever tightened up/adjusted their door release/latch? Any pointers? I'd like to get it tightened back up somehow so that I can keep this sweet new door handle cup in place without breaking it as well.
I assume there is a cable that runs over to the door latch?
It's rods/linkage on these cars. I feel like I haven't seen any bona-fide adjustment with jam nuts or anything, at least when I last looked at the vertical rod for the exterior handle. It seemed to me like the yellow plastic joints might be to blame as they wear and take the abuse of cold frosty days where people really yank on the handle to rip a door open. The rods can definitely bend, it might take only a little distortion to throw things off.
OK. Been awhile since I've had my door panels off. Its slow today so I am sitting at work and thinking about how to tackle this, lol. I couldn't remember if it was cable or rods, etc. I can't imagine how many times my drivers door has been open and closed since 1988. No wonder its worn...
so your speaking to the door handle itself,, correct and not the door latch mechanism?
I know what you mean,,, I ended up bending and tuning in both the ones on our white coug recently
You could simply remove the rod, cut it in half, remove a small section, thread one end right handed and the other left handed, install a turn buckle with jam nuts and you are done. Granted this would take some work but if there is enough room I would think this would give you the adjustment you need. Probably other ways to accomplish the same thing but I just recently did this on another project and it worked very well.
Darren
that's a great idea, cloths line adjuster parts,,, and the bolts are usually about the same size as the rods in your door.
That is a great idea, and I may have to resort to something like that eventually.
I ended up loosening the inner door handle bolt (one that bolts it to the door) and sliding the whole thing forward just enough for the door to open and the handle to not hit the plastic cup. So far so good, my plastic "cups" are still intact. The bad thing is that they make the rest of my interior look really aged.
LX/Turbo Coupe interior FTW (no door handle cups)!
You can restore the interior of your Thunderbird if it's just dingy. After many years of exposure to dirt/humans/vinyl protectant the door panels, sail panels, and dash will look dingy. The best way I've found to clean them is to use "Tuff Stuff" spray foam cleaner and a plastic bristle cleaning brush. Spray the "Tuff Stuff" on the vinyl surface you want to clean and then agitate the buildup in the vinyl grain with the plastic scrub brush. Then wipe clean. The vinyl will be clean but have a matt finish without a sheen. To restore the proper vinyl look (NOT the shiny Armor All look) I use Meguiar's vinyl protectant of the natural sheen variety, not the high gloss one. Makes the almost 28 year old (build date Sep '87) interior on my Thunderbird look like new.
(http://i198.photobucket.com/albums/aa33/thunderjet302/Thunderbird%20web/DSCN3429-Copy_zpsef70d7a2.jpg) (http://s198.photobucket.com/user/thunderjet302/media/Thunderbird%20web/DSCN3429-Copy_zpsef70d7a2.jpg.html)
Yeah I need to do something along those lines. I didn't realize how dingy my door panels were until I got the new cups. I'd love to find some NOS TC door panels for my car. I also need to get my new seat belt sleeves installed, mine are completely roached.
The upholstery on my front two seats is getting very worn and faded (and after 190xxx miles the seat padding is worn out). I'd like to get the front two redone but would really like to keep the stock fabric...I'm guessing there's no where to buy "new" upholstery for our cars.
You didn't take pictures of this by chance? I'm having a hard time visualizing it...
You could try talking to an automotive upholstery shop. You'd be surprised at what they can locate. The local one I use was able to find the leather for my front seats and a patch panel on the rear seat pretty easily.
Really?! Huh, I may have to try that. Problem is that I live in BFE and there really aren't any 'great' upholstery shops around that I'm aware of.
It seems like there are several issues going on here.
Bent door handle? Bend it back correctly...problem solved. The handles will bend, just be careful.
Handle doesn't unlock the door? That's where the rod is involved. Either a bent rod, plastic clip in the latch assembly, or it's floating loose in the door (no tie-down attached).
In 25+ years I've had every door problem you can imagine with these cars. I've never had to cut/thread a bent rod...bending it back usually worked fine.
Carry on...
No Eric the door opens fine. Its just when I installed the new cups the door handle hit it and stopped before it would pop the door latch. I am sure the handle was just out of alignment due to the age/miles of the car. I just loosened the bolt holding the door handle assembly to the door and slid it forward enough to clear the cup.