Minor door problem

[g_land]

Or not so minor as the case may be. I fitted the doors back to the moggie just so it starts looking like a car again, I know i'll have to take them off again to do the floor pan but i just needed see it looking somewhat normal.


Problem: The drivers door has dropped and is now hanging about 3/4 of an inch low at the rear of the door. I don;t know how this happened because the whole structure of the car was braced as soon at the doors came off to make sure something like this didn;t happen.



Anyways, does anyone know the best way of tryingt o fix this. Surely there is some way of doing it.



Thanks

[Kevin]

What work did you do. and why did you brace the car after you took the doors off instead of before.

[g_land]

well the doors were taken off, 5 mins later the car was braced. Should done it the other way but we'll just put that down to a learning experience.

I replaced both chasis legs, central crossmember, both sills and I'm replacing the floor next week. Nearly a full lover half.

Oh this is a traveller if anyone is wondering.

[rayofleamington]

central crossmember, both sills

Erm - best to have the doors on the car. This way you know it all fits.
By the time you've cut the whole sill off the car can be 'adjusted' with less effort than we like to think. I learned this when I cut too much metal out of my 4 door (floor and sills and inner step...)
However if you braced the car before cutting it should have been ok (unless you used the pit-prop techniche where the brace is under load - then when you cut the car structure, the braces work against you and push the car out of shape.

Packing / skimming the door hinges can push the door closer to the new shape door hole, but I think the the easiest way to align it is to use half a dozen jacks to adjust the car to the door before you start welding

[Willie]

Unfortunately,from what you say, it appears that the car
was not adequately supported when you did your welding
work( i used six jacks when I was fitting new sills) the amount
of sag you have will be too much to overcome by shimming
and,even if you did raise it suffficiently the top rear gap of the
door would then be rather large! I suspect that you will have
to de-weld some parts to enable the body to assume its correct
position. (You won't be able to tell if it is the correct position
unless you leave the doors ON)

[g_land]

well i thought the car was braced enough, i had a pair of crossed bars in each of the door spaces, a pair across the b-pillars and also the a-pillar on passenger side to b-billar on drivers side and vise versa.

[edd]

Have you done any work on the hing piller cover /inner wing? if so this might have oulled the front hing piller out of shape. Its a long shot and im not entirly shure but on mine wwithout the cover pannel on you can lift the door up an down and the hing post flexes allitle.

Edd

[g_land]

no the pillar where left as they were, no problem with them.

Its only at the back its falling down. If i padded out the bottom hinge leaving the top one as it is this should cuase the rear of the door to rise.

Anyone see any problems with doing this. We used to do the same hanging wooden doors

[Cam]

If the panel gap from the door to the wing can be sorted and the frame does not hit the rain gutter then go for it! Also check the gap at either end of the sill finishing strip relative to the door bottom.

[rayofleamington]

If i padded out the bottom hinge leaving the top one as it is this should cuase the rear of the door to rise.
Anyone see any problems with doing this

Thats kind of what I meant in the earlier post, and is often done to compensate baldly repaired doorposts.
However whilst you are still at the welding stage, it would be worth a day or two to see if the sill can be released enough to re-jig the car to fit the door, and reweld the sill.

Silly question time:
Are you 100% sure that the door post is not flexing and that the hinges are good and that there wasn't a packing piece under one of the hinnges to start with?

[g_land]

no there was no packing piece under the hinge to begin with.

Thats kind of what I meant in the earlier post

Sorry didn't understand fully what you meant.

I'll check the door post again but i don;t think its moving.

Also on the bracing from earlier, the offside door is perfect so i think the bracing was good.

[rayofleamington]

Packing / skimming the door hinges can push the door closer to the new shape door hole

Packing one hinge a lot can move the edge door into the b-post so it is also possible (bodge) to have a couple of mm removed from the other hinge.

[Willie]

The question is, if the edge which is too low was raised would
the door fit into the opening or would it foul the B pillar? If it
would fit in then you should be able to shim or modify the TOP
hinge position to suit. If the door would foul the B pillar then
it would seem that the opening is of the wrong shape!
With the bottom hinge, experiment with cardboard packing to
see what the results would be. If your front wing has not been
disturbed then you can check the panel gap between it and the
leading edge of the door.

[g_land]

ok looking at it again over the weekend i looks more like the whole door has dropped about 1/2 inch, the adjustment that the hinges allow doesn;t seem to be enough to bring it up fully.

Is there anyway of raising the hinges, sorry about the confusion earlier, i thought it was just down at the back but its actually down all over.

[simmitc]

Just about everything has been covered, but for what it's worth, if you need packing pieces for the hinges go to JLH (see traders) they do laser cut pieces from 0.5mm - 3mm in 0.5 mm steps, and for both the pillar and door side of the hinges - brilliant. Most likely problem still sounds like worn hinges / pins. I've seen the same problem numerous times and its always been the worn pins. You can get oversize pins from any trader.

Check for movement with the door wide open - can you lift the handle end? Also, when aligning the door, consider that the window frame is bolt on to the door and might have moved check for splits on the door around the quarter light pillar.

One other solution is to use the traditional brute force (jacks / hammer) to move the A post hinge pillar.

Good luck

[Willie]

Unless my memory is playing tricks the door CAN be raised
on the hinges. Place a trolley jack(padded to avoid paint scratches)
under the front edge of the door and then slacken the A pillar
hinge bolts. Mark around the hinges first so that you see where
any movement was. I am pretty sure that you will be able to
lift the door once the bolts are loosened.