Door Locks

[taxatthebeach]

With my 1997 Ford Explorer I have had a problem for some time but now the problem has become worse and is creating a real issue. The driver side door lock has been inconsistent in whether it will allow me to open the door from the outside. Frequently, when it is locked, I can not unlock the door from the outside. Neither the key nor the remote will work. All the other three doors (four if you count the rear door) work fine, but in order to get in the car from the driver's side I have had to enter through the back door and reach through and open the door with the door handle from the inside. This has always been an inconvenience but not a big issue except when the weather is bad and I am delayed in getting into the car. I bought the car used with about 37,000 miles on it about six years ago and the problem existed then. The problem got worse yesterday when the inside door handle got stuck and when I was able to open it I found that from that point on the inside door handle no longer worked and the only way to open the driver side door was from the outside. Now I am afraid to lock the door for fear that if I do and the outside handle will not open it, neither will the inside door handle. Outside of the obvious danger of not being able to open the driver side door, it could become awful inconvenient to have to enter from the passenger side and climb over the console. I am afraid that I will inadvertently lock the car and then be screwed. Does anyone know of any obvious suspects as to the problem and perhaps a reasonably easy way to fix it. At this point my plan is to try to take off the door panel this weekend and see if I can figure out the problem by inspecting the linkage, etc. Of course if I do that I will not be able to get the unknown part until some time next week, at best, and that will stretch the repair out over at least two weekends.

 

[heyok]

Take a look in this thread. Don't take off your door panel until you read it because it might not be needed. Driver's door won't unlock!

Al

 

[Turdle]

I added a little comment to above thread
That was my experience and repair of this problem

 

[mikeh]

Here is a link to a thread that should help.

http://www.explorerforum.com/forums/showthread.php?t=113217&page=1&pp=20

 

[wierwolf]

I had the same problem with my driver door. Interesting to see alot of people have that problem. My problem now is I lost my power lock remote. Can I disable the system some how to start my car?

 

[DBray6]

I had the same problem also. I see alot of post about the spring, but my spring was fine. I just lubed the latch mechanism like crazy and I have had no problems since. I did remove the door panel to do it so I could get all areas. Mine works perfectly now.

 

[davem]

Do you lube the parts that actually go around the door post ? What kind of lube ?

Dave
01 Explorer XLT 65K miles, with drivers door lock that is not working sometimes