This morning, my mom went out to start my truck for me to let it heat up before I left cause its really cold up here (temp reading is at 0). I don't know what she did but she said when she unlocked the door and opened it, the door wouldn't close so she bungeed it. When I got out to the truck I tried closing the door but it wouldn't catch and stay closed. I decided to try locking the door and closing it to see if it would stay closed. It did. Now when I try to unlock it, it wont unlock. The lock tab is stuck down and can't be pulled up and the key wont turn to unlock it. Now I can't get the door to open to take off the panel.

1. Is there an easy way to take off the door panel when the door is shut?
2. What is wrong? Did something just fall off or is it broken?

The truck is a 94 4runner if that matters. Please, any help is greatly appreciated.

 

Sounds like either:

A: one of the springs in the lock setup popped off, which is uncommon unless you try to slim-jim the lock.

B: The lock is frozen, wait for it to warm up and see if that changes anything. Park in a garage if you can.

I had option A happen to me once before. It's a long story, so I'll spare the details, but needless to say, you can get the door panel off with the door shut. Trust me. It's way more flexible than it appears to be, and I have different seats (buckets) in my truck that take up more room, thus making less room to work. It sucked, but I got it. LOL.

 

I'm sorry, I never got past the part about your mom going out to start your truck to warm it up for you...

 

I had this happen to my 90 on monday... I had to use a heat gun to warm the door, it was frozen then I got the panel off and Wd40'd the locks and the latch....

 

I would bet the cold is the problem. My locks have gone to crap in this weather. We hit -13 last night.