Front door detent broken

bkoeth · Post by **bkoeth** » 13 Sep 2006, 19:36

I don't know if it's called a detent, but the little arm the holds my driver's door open has failed and the door tries to close on me on slight uphills. This looks totally ghetto. Is this a bolt-on part, and where can I find one?

Post by **MadeInJapan** » 13 Sep 2006, 21:22

Do you mean this?
http://au.geocities.com/ozbrick850/door ... html#frank

bkoeth · Post by **bkoeth** » 14 Sep 2006, 06:18

close, but mine doesn't make noise. It just doesn't work. The door opens quietly, but does not stay open. Thanks for the link, it will be really helpful if I do need to remove the stay itself.

Post by **JRL** » 14 Sep 2006, 06:46

New one needs to be welded on, body shop time

DVolvoguy777 · Post by **DVolvoguy777** » 14 Sep 2006, 07:32

JRL wrote:New one needs to be welded on, body shop time

JRL,

Check that link MIJ put up in his post. That is a great fix really. Weld at $300 Bucks? Too much money.

If my doors brake there I will use hilocks and collars instead of nuts and bolts. Will last for ever and stay tight!

cocka · Post by **cocka** » 14 Sep 2006, 15:21

It suprises me that some smart person hasn't come up wiith a repair kit to fix just this thing, a shaped plate with pretapped holes (there's your template to drill the holes in the bodywork) and a couple of domed Unbrako type bolts would be just the thing.

DVolvoguy777 · Post by **DVolvoguy777** » 15 Sep 2006, 07:13

You aint kidding Cocka, Heck even Jo-Bolts would work. They are the same kind of thing as the Unbrako bolts but easier to remove if nessisary. You do not even need nuts for these things. Or even have to thread them. ( using a Jo-Bolt or blind bolt if you will )

http://www.usatco.com/hi_shear_hand_tools_01.asp

Post by **MadeInJapan** » 15 Sep 2006, 07:33

Would be a great tool to use if you already have one or if you would be using it for other repairs. I just don't see buying a tool upward of or near $200 for this repair. Guess I would use the tape on the end of my finger and a regular bolt to do this repair. Fortunately I've lubed my door hinges religiously knowing that these doors are apt to having issues and have been able to avoid this problem so far. On my old 850, the door strap did break, but this was before knowing about this site or others that show what to do. We traded the car in with the broken strap and the dealer deducted $300 from our trade-in claiming that that's what it would take for them weld it as well as taking all of the wiring out of the area prior to applying the heat. I'd say that whatever works without much cost is a good option!

bobsnow100 · Post by **bobsnow100** » 15 Sep 2006, 08:21

Hello
My 1995 850 has this problem
Thanks for all the ideas. I am going to try this repair with a couple modifications to try to simplify it. My idea would be to ,once you have your 2 holes drilled out in the door jamb ,measure your center to center spacing of the holes. Next get a flat piece of flat steel and drill out 2 holes with the same center to center spacing. Next tap 2 threads into the steel plate to accept your 2 bolts. You then can feed a wire down through the top hole in the plate and down through the top drilled hole in the door jamb and let the plate slide down so the holes line up. Next you then can install the bottom bolt and snug it and then pull the wire out and install the top bolt, nothing will spin because the plate with the 2 holes will prevent it spinning like a nut would

sntee · Post by **sntee** » 18 Sep 2006, 13:49

Just a word of caution to anyone who has the above problem, but is thinking of putting off the repair until it gets bad enough (and I speak from bitter personal experience!)

My door made a loud cracking noise every time I opened it. This went on for several months but never really got any worse. I guessed it was a problem with the spring mech in the stay itself, so I figured I would replace it when it failed altogether.

What I didn't realise was that when I was openeing the door, the bracket the stay was attached to was flexing and the noise was actually the stay snapping into position when the bracket couldn't bend any further.

The picture cuts a long story short.....

When it eventually failed through fatigue, I couldn't shut the door at all, so had to detach the bracket and leave the stay hanging.

Be warned!!!