I know this is a pathetic topic to ask for help on, but my handle broke and I cant open from the outside. I removed my door panel and was looking at it and dont see the problem. Its an 88 AE, I was wondering if it is just a metal piece that broke and I should just reweild it, or is it an eletronic problem and I should just buy a new door handle. Thanks if anyone has help on this topic.

 

It's probably a control rod that is no longer attached to the handle. They are connected by little plastic fitting that snap over the rod and into the handle. Can you snap a pic or something? New handles are easy to find at junk yards too, but I'd place my money on the possibility that one of your little plastic end fittings broke.

Steve

P.S. Pull the other door interior piece off and take a look at what a functioning handle looks like. You should be able to find out what's wrong/missing between the good handle and the bad handle.

 

Were you able to get the door open? Provided that all the rods are still connected, you should be able to mess with them and pull the right one eventually to open the door. I also suggest having a look at the diagram in the FSM. I had a similar problem with mine, and as it turned out there's a spring on the lock that broke. we just bent a new eye in the spring, and reconnected it and it works fine. It was a pain in the *** though and I put a couple of scratched into my door while removing/installing the handle. Be extra careful so that doesn't happen to you. It should be pretty easy to fix when you get it apart to find the problem, but it's a huge pain in the ***. Every door is. They're designed that way as I understand it. :-/

 

Yeah so if its not a piece of plastic, it could be the actual metal that breaks. I'm on my third door handle. I've heard members and documents saying JBWeld the broken metal.. but it really doesn't work nearly as well as you think it should. I've gotten pretty good at popping door handles in and out, and could have them interchanged in about 5-10 minutes including dismantling the door. Coincidentaly, my lock mechs use a different key than the ignition now though :/

 

There's a piece of metal that pivots on a anchor point that pushes down on the rod that allows the door to open. What happens is, that mount that the metal piece pivots on sheers off allowing the length to slip off and no longer push down on the rod.

You may have some success pushing the metal piece back onto the pivot point, but it'll just pop off again in about 2-3 pulls of the handle. I actually slipped a zip tie around the place where it pivots and it's been working great for about 4-5 months now.

I'd have to search the FSM for pics that could possibly describe what I'm talking about, or if anyone has a picture of the inner guts of the door handle, I can gladly point out what needs to be done if yours is broken in similar fashion.

 

You can remove the key cylinder from one handle and transfer it to another. That's what I did on mine.

I'd also recommned just buying new instead of used. I bought a used one and it is rubbing like my door handle did before it broke. Only a matter of time before it catches and brakes.

 

I've just gotten use to crawling in and out of the pass. door

 

I bought one to replace mine but I lost the damn thing, I guess back to the j-yard.

 

I would say either the actual inner part of the handle broken or one of the control arms is messed up, but if you can't see the problem then I would say door handle. Just unhook the control arms and the handle is held in by two 10mm nuts, roll the window up to take the one closest to the front of the car off, and roll it down to take the other off, also there should be a black rubber thing to remove to get to the rearmost nut.

 

it's the little plastic i bet right nexted to the handle, like somebody said earlier..you can get that at a juckyard very cheap...like 5 finger discount cheap....heck even show it to them... hahhaha yeah it's always those like 5 cent pieces that get ya...