Driver door has a hard time opening

[eddtheman]

This is my first post on this forum, so I hope I’m doing this right:

I just bought a 66 bird and I’m new to the scene, so I don’t really know much about the platform. However, I noticed that when trying to open the driver door, it needs to almost be yanked just for it to open. It closes just fine and slightly pokes out, but it’s nothing major.

It also has a very stiff locking mechanism that takes a LOT of force just to lock/unlock the door.

It opens fine from the inside, but the outer opening mechanism is what’s bothering me, and I can’t seem to find a good answer to this. Has anyone else had this problem?

[64ZCODE]

Welcome to TBird ownership and the forum. You could start by making sure the door is not physically binding against the door frame. Then apply penetrating oil liberally to the hinges and latch and work the mechanisms until they free up.

[eddtheman]

Thanks for the reply, I’ll do that as soon as I can. If that doesn’t do the trick what would you recommend? Could be it a locking rod?

[64ZCODE]

Hi there eddtheman, Re-reading your original post, I noticed you said the door sticking problem is only when using the outside door handle. So for some reason, the outside handle doesn't release the door latch the way that it should. Hopefully lubrication will free the latch up and fix this, but the problem could be in the action of the handle mechanism itself or the positioning of the rod connecting the handle to the latch. Suggest you pull off the door card so you can see the entire mechanism to trouble shoot.

[Terry64HT]

Here's a photo of the interior mechanism of one of my doors. As you can see, there's not much to it. If the outside button isn't working well, things are almost certainly gummed up at the elongated slot at the bottom of the rod. Once you clean it and get it working, don't glob it up with grease. It's nylon sliding on metal and doesn't need a lot of lubrication. Grease will just attract dirt and dust, then harden.
Hope this helps
Terry
64HT