So my hinges were completey SHOT on my driver side door when I bought the car, and it sagged really bad. As a result the latch on my '92 'Bird is toast. Recently I repaired my hinges and stopped by the salvage yard to get a new latch. Looked like I wasnt the only one with that problem, as I took the last driver side latch from the 6 3rd gens there. Searching the forums I havn't been able to find a definite answer on whether or not all the latches are interchangable, so I took a chance and bought this latch from an '88 (or '87, don't remember) Camaro. There is slight difference, but it is more than possible for it to work.

For starters, here are the two side by side:

 

Here is the lever that gets pulled on from the rod to the inside door handle.

Note that the older style uses a metal clip, and the newer uses the plastic interlocking clip. This is where it becomes a little less simple than just swapping over latches one for the other. The older style rods have a valley machined into the ends of them, to fit into the metal clips like an "E" clip would on a pin. The newer style rods are smooth all through out, as the plastic clip is designed in a way to hold the rod against itself.

The holes for the plastic clips on the newer style latch are larger than the holes on the older style latch, so they can't be swapped over without drilling the holes out a little bit to recieve them. If you were putting a newer style latch in an older car, this is of no worry.

 

These pics show the lever that gets actuated by the rod to the door lock cylinder. Again, note the clip style difference.

 

These pics show the lever that gets acted on by the lock slide on the interior of the vehicle. Clips are different, I just slightly mangled it while pulling it out .

 

The rod that comes from the outside handle doesn't have a clip because the way its designed won't allow it to fall out.

I installed the older latch in my newer car and she opens and closes no problem and locks and unlocks without issue. Just making a straight forward thread with no speculation on this issue as I couldn't find a definative answer on it.

 

Always great to see a thorough investigation of important details. Thanks for posting!

 

great post