partynoparty

My back seat drive side door handle (exterior) quit working. I took the door panel off, but still can't get to whatever part is broken. There is a plastic panel inside the door (that I can't figure out how to remove) that blocks access to the outer door handle assembly. What would be the next step in disassembling this thing?

scope103

A picture would help.

On most cars (including my truck) there is a sheet of heavy (8 mil or so) clear plastic held on with what can be best described as tar. It's designed to keep rainwater out of the vehicle. A heat gun, or even a hair dryer, will gently melt the "tar" and allow you to safely peel it back. Be careful; if you get your arm into that stuff it will stick like, well, tar.

partynoparty

Thanks for the reply. The piece I was referring to is a panel of hard plastic about 7x7. There is one screw securing it, but it is also held into place at the top as well, and even if I were able to free it there doesn't seem to be space enough to pull it out of the door. I've attached a photo. It seems like a need to take things apart a bit more to get at the door handle, but I didn't want to just start taking screws out all willy nilly without knowing what I was doing. Thanks.

scope103

underneath the plug (circled) will (almost certainly) be a fastener, probably the one you need to release the hard plastic. At some point it has to come out through the opening; they built the truck, after all. (this is a good place to use that hair dryer; the plug gets brittle with age, and if you warm it up to about body temperature it will be less like to break as you work it out)

I'm guessing you need to remove the push rods first. In fact, a push rod disconnecting is probably why your door doesn't work. Since I don't have back doors I can't help you directly, but pictures here: https://www.yotatech.com/forums/f116...t-work-254772/ might give you an idea what you're feeling for.

partynoparty

Thanks a lot. I'll give this a go.

partynoparty

Still not having any luck removing this panel. I removed the round plug, but this didn't seem to bear any relevance to the removal of the plastic panel. From what I can tell it is being held in place by a metal clip at the TOP of the panel. It's a bit hard to see, but I've attached a photo. Any help here would be very much appreciated. Thanks.