Rear passenger door locked closed - help!

[dtmorgan]

Hi everyone,

I have just bought a Mk 4 GTI, but didn't spot that the rear nearside passenger door would not unlock fully. This seems a common problem, but how do you fix it? The door appears to do all the right things, the actuator moves the pop up up when using the remote but the door remains locked.

I managed to remove the door card in the hope I could access the mechanism, but without having access to the two torx bolts either side of the outer lock mechanism, the whole assembly can't be removed. The outer door handle cable hasn't broken and the inner pull rod is connected. I am totally at a loss what to do next.

Is there a way of opening the door to access the mechanism?

Just read this thread https://www.vwaudiforum.co.uk/forum/s...rear+door+lock, which seems similar, ie the dead lock mechanism has failed, but how do smash the lock?

[wadey5187]

Just got home from messing with my step daughters Mk4 Golf rear offside door, wouldn't stay shut, def not electrical, stripped it down and applied a couple of gallons of WD40 seems to be working BUT when we had put it altogether the catch was in the closed position and we couldn't shut the door ! We then released the short cable that attaches to the door handle and the catch freed itself and we attached the cable again ! Seems OK and the problem cannot be wear and tear as the door is hardly ever used. The whole thing has been a nightmare not helped by continuous rain and cold, will post a couple of photos in a min and a word of warning

[wadey5187]

We managed to break the bracket that holds the window glass in place, not recommended

[wadey5187]

The strange thing is if you pull the cable that attaches to the door handle, in fact you are moving it further than the door handle does, you can feel it move something and the door always clicks shut (and stays shut) we could not dismantle the mechanisms itself to investigate this further
The other odd thing is that the spring in the middle of this photo looks like it should be in the slot on the arm operated by the exterior door handle but isn't so what purpose does this serve ?