So the most amazing of situations just happened to me. My interior door handle drivers side snapped and would no longer work. I ordered a new one yesterday, today, as luck would have it, my exterior door handle also snapped... So, now I have no way of opening or closing my driver side door. does anyone have a good strategy for opening my door so I can actually replace these parts? any help would be much appreciated

 

pull off the bezel inside the car and pull on the rod

 

appreciate it man, I'll see what I can do with it tomorrow.

 

Just roll the window down and then standing outside the car with a good
flashlight look down inside the rear of the door.

Look for the handle to latch rods.

Use a strong wire or rod to grab the handle rods and pull it up
to release the lach and open door.

 

So my parts finally came in and I attempted to open the door with a wire, no luck, tried the mechanism for both outside and inside handles. I was able to pull off part of the door trim and get my hand on the mechanism but cant tell what i am feeling, but it appears as though the mechanism is broken. Am I SOL and taking the car to an actual shop or is there a workaround I can do?

 

They may not do much more than what you're trying now. Even worse if they're not familiar with older vehicles like ours.

I think you may be able to use something like a yardstick but metal if you can find something similar. If you see how it moves you should be able to go through the window slots and push down on the tab. Sorry if that's not clear, have other things on my mind right now.

 

Top rod is door release and the bottom one is for the door lock.




Inside of the door looking at the latch mechanism. Push down on the door handle rod to release the door.

Hope this helps...

 

Look down inside the door on the other side, see what moves when you pull the door latch.

 

thanks for the quick replies guys, I have looked at the other door to see how it works, but neither way is working on this door, pushing down or pulling the rod, it's starting to worry me

 

You didn't happen to lock the door while messing around in there did you? I have messed with a stubborn door before just to realize the door kept locking as I reached in lol!

 

haha, I did the first time around and was careful to make sure it was unlocked after that

 

Got the door open today after some intense disection of the door. The lock wasn't the problem, the latch was jammed but I got it free enough to release the door. the latch no longer works though so a new one is on its way. i appreciate the help guys

 

Was it rusty? Or was it just frozen on the inside. I've rarely heard of this happening which is why I am curious

 

Congrats! Good to hear.

 

it's not fully removed yet, but it looks rusted and I can see the spring for the mechanism is disconnected and bent out of shape.

 

Great to hear that you were able to get the door open! Now the fun part of cutting the hell out of your arm while changing out the latch!