Stuck Door Latch
Sometimes I do jobs that even the dealerships hesitate doing. Recently I got a call from a lady who had trouble opening her drivers door. It seems that no matter what she did, the door just refused to open. Well, I had heard of this problem from the Honda Tech-line.
It seems that someone had figured out how to get the door open from the inside without destroying the door. The problem was that you had to get the door panel off to access the inside of the door. To get the door panel off without breaking it, the seat needed to be removed. With the seat removed and the door panel removed, it was a fairly simple matter to drill the latch with a portable drill in a VERY specific spot. Hopefully the drill bit hits the release mechanism and the door opens.
But, not this time. I drilled the hole in the exact spot and the door still refused to open. So, I drilled a bigger hole in the latch. Still no open door. Well, I then went to “PLAN B”. Which was to drill out the latch everywhere and hope to hit just the right spot. I drilled and drilled and drilled. Finally after about an hour of totally destroying the latch, the door opened. After which I installed a new latch and reinstalled the seat and the door panel.