I got tired of driving around without door panels, so my dad and I worked to figure out exactly what part of the door lock on the passenger side was broken so I could reassemble the driver's side door and order the parts for the passenger side. After looking at it we figured out that there is a little tab missing on this piece of the lock mechanism.
The part that holds that whitish plastic piece to the metal rod that operates the lock is missing. I ordered a new one of those white pieces which will hopefully be in today or tomorrow :) Since we what to replace and how to fix it, I went ahead and set out to put the driver's door back together. It took forever, but eventually I found something that I thought would be a suitable adhesive. It's called Windo Weld by 3M and worked like a charm.
The previous owner had already cut the hole out for the speaker, so it's just in there without any plastic to protect the wiring but I think it'll be OK. I've been driving it without the plastic on there at all in the rain and everything else and haven't noticed any leaks. Anyway, this took about a week trying to find that Windo Weld stuff. Then I had to order new plastic clip deals to hold the panel back on. During that time I figured I'd go ahead and fix the damage that the PO had done to the door panel.
When he replaced the mirror after the accident, instead of taking the panel off he just tore the corner so he could get to the mirror backplate -_- Some Gorilla Glue fixed this up.
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| So yeah, I got a little bit excessive with the glue... |
It still needs to be cleaned up some, and unfortunately I'm still using the arm rest that's covered in duct tape until I can find a replacement.
Another thing that wasn't working was the dome light. Well, first of all it was installed backwards. The dome light in these trucks is supposed to flip down so you can also use it to illuminate the bed. The PO had installed it backwards so when you flipped it down it didn't do anything useful at all. I reoriented the dome light and began tracking down what was wrong with the door open sensor. All the wiring looked good but it didn't ding when the key was in and the door was open on either side. I checked the passenger side door open sensor and it was connected. Checked the driver's side and it was not. After some work (there's barely any slack at all on that wiring) I got the sensor reconnected and reinstalled. After this I closed both doors and cycled the power on the truck, then opened the door and it started a pleasant little charm sound. I wish all cars sounded like this, it's not deafeningly annoying like most modern door-open alarms. The dome light now fades in and out nicely :)
It's so nice having light in the cab... during the night it was practically impossible to see anything in there, and with the on/off switch being on the wrong side it was easier for me to just use my cell phone flashlight than it was using the dome. I've also ordered a set of factory map lights :)
