93 Passat Stuck Door

[Wayland]

The car is a 93 Passat Eco diesel. This car has been so much trouble that I'm very close to pulling the motor and installing it in a Mk1 chassis, and ditching the rest of the car. I may, however, give it one more chance. Currently the passenger door is stuck shut. It seems to be locked, and the lock button moves up and down a bit but is very stiff. Both handles move freely as if the door is locked. I've never run into a problem like this with any car. Any ideas how to get the door open, short of cutting a hole in the door panel to access the latch? The door worked fine until once I tried to close it and it wouldn't latch shut. I can't remember exactly what I did, but eventually it latched. the next time I went to open it it was stuck.

[8v-of-fury]

ahah, right on. SAME PROBLEM! only mines an 81.. damn vw's eh? i too hope someone figures it out, gf gettin in an out of my door is pissin me off

[the caveman]

You can try to take the outside handle off the get right the lock and spray some loose nut or whatever to free it up. Open the rear door and you can see the screw for the handle. BUT the screw is reverse thread [don't ask how i found out]. Take out the screw, push the handle towards the front, careful not to break the wire-although if you're scrapping it ,then don't be careful. You should then be able to see part of the lock mechanism. Some wd-40 and moving all the levers around should eventually get it open.

[the caveman]

BTW the reverse thread of the handle is only on 93-95 passats- just in case .

[Wayland]

Ok, got the door fixed, so I guess I'll give the car another chance. I had to take the top hinge bolt out of the rear door and pivot it down slightly (with a helper holding it up) to access the screw. It was indeed a Lt hand thread. Why the %^&*(( would they do that??

[the caveman]

yeah the left hand thread was some VW engineer's idea of a joke, Or maybe they were worried it would vibrate off like the mid 60's Dodge's R/S wheel nuts.

[Wayland]

If you hadn't clued me in about the LH thread, I'd probably still be working on it. At first I couldn't get it to turn in either direction.