Help needed with door!!

cajos1968

Well-known member
Joined
May 13, 2008
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372
Location
Leiden, The Netherlands
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I need some help/advise with my right door.

It does not align right with the body, It sits too low and the front gap is to small (chipped the paint of, %&^&^ :cussing: there goos my new paint job), the rear gap is too big. I have no more options in the hinges. WHAT to do next any ideas?
 
These doors are indeed a PIA to fit.

I enlarged the holes in the pillar to get more movement out of it. A little grinding with a file made a huge difference. Good luck.
 
can you get a 1/8" off the hinge on the door side?? loosen and move hinge away from door edge???

I would try that first....windows can be a PIA though....

sorry to hear about the paint job....yet another reason I don't want to paint the car.....

:gurney::gurney::crap:
 
I don't under stand!!

That would bring the door in. I already have the problem that the door is too tight against the car.

OOpps no that would bring the door out. Can I use a grinder? or does it need more precision?
 
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Cajos, you can enlarge the holes slightly in either the front or the rear location in order to get more movement out of them. I found out that with mine, it was the only way to get it to fit right. You might be lucky to fiddle around with that door some more.

Anyway, the amount you would have to grind of with a file is tiny.
 
Body shops will grind the door and grind the body, then use filler to get them to line up.

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The hinges have 2 ways of adjustment, loosen the bolts on the door and you can move it up and down and angle it. Loosen the bolts in the A pillar and you can move the door fore/aft. What you need to do is loosen those in the pillar and move the door all the way back.
 
I will never again, for love nor money ever remove doors off of a c3. Bet this last experience took 20 years off my life. It takes alot of time, hours to adjust the doors properly. Then, wait until you start adjusting the windows.......... Good Lord. Then, the door locks......

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Good Luck
 
Body shops will grind the door and grind the body, then use filler to get them to line up.

5mab2a.jpg
240xe01.jpg

Bloke I surely hope that was a before picture!! The gaps diver from top to bottom. But still I envy them!! :bump:

My gaps before painting we close to perfect. After painting I noticed that body mount #3 on the right side was damaged, and needed repalcement. Now I'm in trouble because the door was made to fit before this. :cussing:

I have no issue aligning the locks or windows. Locks are easy, just do the opposite of what you are thinking ;)
 
Those gaps are about as good as you're going to get them without working on the gaps for a week.

Your yellow, is it a single stage or base/clear? It should be pretty easy to repaint and blend in.
 
Kewl TT, glad the trip went well, where'd ya go? LOL

My door jambs look about the same, looked that way from factory, fit was not real good from day one. :lol:

One note to add on my experience, I am a big ole boy with short stubby hands and fingers, therefore, before you go and beat your kids or run off the wife, make use of there abilities, my wife has tiny hands and she knocked out the door locks in minutes, made me look like a fool. :confused2:

Man, I love you guys, great info here, thanks to all! :thumbs:

t
 
I will never again, for love nor money ever remove doors off of a c3. Bet this last experience took 20 years off my life. It takes alot of time, hours to adjust the doors properly. Then, wait until you start adjusting the windows.......... Good Lord. Then, the door locks......

life-support.jpg


Good Luck


Not far from the truth :eek:h:
 
Some result

Today I worked on the body side slots, to increase the front gap. With success, the door is more in line and acceptable. I the rear side of the door (top) is slightly outward. I will ad an extra sim below to see if that brings something.

One major issue remains, the door striker pulls the door down (it is at it highest location). Is there a solution for that. This coming week new door strikers will hopefully arrive.
 
Who did your body mounts and shimming? Something is way out of whack for you to have all these issues, it's almost as if the rocker channel is bent. I hate to say it, but you may find out that your T-tops won't fit after all this.

As for the striker bolt, it threads into a nut plate which rides in a little cage.
Hope you can sort of see it here, the hole is largely oversized to give you some adjustment, the cage is only accessible from the back. You CAN remove the bolt and carefully grind out the hole so you have more adjustment on the top but I'm not sure how much you can gain without the nut plate stopping against the cage. It's well worth a shot.

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If you carefully look inside the birdcage here you can see the "cage" for the nut plate, it's that large sort of box on the inside (make sure you click for 100% view)

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Yes, it's bad.

You can see it by checking the sides for straightness. The U channels along the frame, with the fiberglass on top. Check if the inside and outside are straight, if there's a bulge in them they are bent. What it does is, it tilts the A pillar forward in respect to the rest of the body. I had that problem because my birdcage was damaged, it was smashed in at the #1 body mount.

If you don't know what I mean, it's basically the "dorpel" (<- dutch word for those wondering :) )

To repair it you need to cut the fiberglass that's bonded on top of it and weld in a fresh straight section.

You can also add some shims to the #1 body mount location and crank down the #2 bolt and persuade the a pillar to come in. You do have to remove the window for that though.

What came with the car? New body mounts? But you need to shim them so you don't warp the body. What you do is, you align the body with the dowel holes, and then check if some mounts need a shim or 2 added. Work your way around the body to check if the body is touching the mounts on all places so that no one of them is sitting free (this usually happens with the #2 & 3 positions if the 1 &4s are too tall) after shimming make sure the body is still level on the frame and centered over the alignment holes (they are under those plugs in the rocker channels)
 
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