Completed my install today of new upper and lower bushing on my driver door. The door was fairly rough, it would drop down while opening. Determined the lower pin had popped up and could see a lot of movement on the lower jimge.

I used an air hammer to chisel off the edges of the pins in the upper hinge.

Tried to get a good shotnof my air hammer with chisel, definitely tough in a tight space.

I used a Dremel with a cutting disc to slice across the smaller part of the pin, then worked with with the chisel on the air hammer to slowly break it loose. As others have said, takes patience.

 

After breaking the upper hinge pins loose, the lower pin popped out WAY too easily. My pictures didn't show much, but after removing the door, I found both upper bushings cracked and chunks missing, and one of the lower bushing slid out without any pressure.

Aside from the trouble closing the door, the other reason I removed the door was to repair the o ly rust spot on the car. A rust hole had developed behind the weatherstripping on the front lower corner.

Odd spot for rust to form. I think water got trapped behind the weatherstripping.

Took quite a bit of work to cut out the rot, shape and weld in a patch, then finish off the repair.

Patch cut from sheet metal on the parts car. Shaped and formed to fit.

Patch welded in place. Took a friend of a friend kind of deal, but it turned out great!

After getting a light skin of bondo and sanded down. Read6 for paint.

 

Installed the door today. Pics of the finished product:


Upper pins installwd


Lower pin in place

After installing the pins, the door closed better than I could have expected. VERY happy with the result!

 

Told and parts I used.

I bought the GM spring compressor many years ago for working on an OBS truck. As much effort as it required to compress the spring enough to fit into its spot, I can't imagine getting the spring into place without the tool


The bushing and pins kit I used is Dorman 38941. Had a picture of it, must have run out of memory...

 

Nice job!

 

Thanks! One of those jobs i was not looking forward to, but had to be done. The door closed SO much better now! The door gaps were spot on before I removed the door, so I wanted to leave the hinges alone to preserve that alignment. All in all, maybe a better way to do it? Would still have taken the air hammer and chisel to get the upper line out, although the angles would have been easier to access. However, more work to get the door aligned at the end.

Glad I did it this way.

Passenger door will follow in the future, especially if we stay in lockdown here in Texas. Bought enough parts for both doors, and smarter now after doing one. Not really though!

 

Good work, keep up

 

I like how you used the magnets. That's a great idea!!!

Did the pins remove all of the movement in your door? I replaced mine but my lower hinge was so bad that I ended up replacing it. Door shuts great now.

 

Yes, bushings and pins did the trick. Closes nice and the alignment gaps are good.

Took the opportunity to do the passenger side as well. Had to do some more rust repair, not as ever as the weld in patch, just some small pinholes. Will wait a few days for the paint to cure then hang it too.


Few area where rust had formed. I ground away to clean metal and filled with JB Weld, primed and painted.

 

With both door panels off, has been a great time to work on cleaning and greasing the lock mechanism and window regulators, too.

 

Nice work. It is great that you took pics of the entire operation. Thanks for the informative way you went about it.

 

I am really glad I could help. This site has been such a HUGE help to me, not just in my current project but my earlier ones, like programming fuel injection on my 78 Vette. All much information here it is scary!

just glad I can help contribute.

 

You have mad skills for sure. Where about in Texas are you?

 

Is your cars color code "51U"? Just curious. In the pics, it looks like the same color as my '86 IROC-Z.
DR.K.

 

I think 51U is an 86-88 color, 85 (my year) is 50U. Lower ground effects might be 15L. I could be dead wrong, and would appreciate any education of the subject as I will eventually be getting g the car painted.

 

I think you may be right about that. Color code history is one of the things I don't know a whole lot about on these cars. In the pictures, it looks like the exact same color as my car, but who can tell, what with all the fading that Texas and Arizona do to the paint on our cars. I'm really conflicted about what color to repaint my car. I'm not really big on keeping my car"original", but I kind of want to keep a stockish look to the body. I sort of want to go with a darker yellow, the way your door looks with the repaint you did, after the rust repair. Which looks perfect, by the way. It's what's kept me from repainting the car, all these years. I think I'm going to repaint it in Corvette c5 yellow, but just haven't pulled the trigger on it yet.
Your color code should be on the RPO sticker in the center console, I believe.
DR.K.

 

Unfortunately, the label in my center console has been lost to the sands of time. Here is something that I found in the glove box, possibly what the car was most recently painted with?

 

I can give you a tip when replacing the door detent spring using the door spring tool. When you've compressed the spring solid to remove it from the door hinge, open the door spring tool fully. Before removing the spring from the tool mark the orientation of the spring to the tool. Then remove the spring and reinsert the tool into the spring capturing one more coil. Now when you compress the spring solid to reinstall the spring it will go in easier. When you've fully opened the spring tool it won't want to come free of the spring. Simply use a large screwdriverto pry it free of the spring.

Lon