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Cannot get interior door panel to stick


Brendan The Spit

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Posted

So the car interior's looking pretty good now with the new wheel and dash. There's just one thing I cannot get fixed: the interior door panel on the passenger side.

It's come away from the door, and I've tried every which way but the clip just won't stay in the hole. If I bang it with my fist it might occasionally stay in for a fraction of a second then goes ping and comes out again.

It looks to me like the hole in the door frame is just maybe a bit too  large for the clip. I've tried working the clip so that it has a larger 'reach' - ie pulling it open more to give it a chance to stay put in a larger hole - but that doesn't work.

Anyone else have this difficulty? Any easy fixes? The temption is, of course, just to glue it in place but that way madness lies. I've attached a pic showing the gap as you look down into the door, if that helps.

Posted

And yes, I have also tried a larger clip, before you ask! I've got a nice selection from previous work on the car when, you know, you wind up with more clips lying around than when you started...

But if it really is a case of sourcing proper, nice, new larger clips, and that's a fix that worked for you, then let me know!

Also, I just noticed, my luverly HTC phone gives you a pinsharp image of the seat but not the bally part of the image I actually wanted to be focussed....

Posted

Hmmm, radical thinking! I could do but that would involve taking the entire panel off, drilling (scary) and all that palaver. I was really hoping just to be able to fix it in situ. I know, I know, there's no such thing as a small job. Everything I ever do to this car seems to take at least 10 hours.

Posted

if you could put a small washer behind the offending hole, that would work but i guess it would need to be the first clip you put on so you could hold the washer at the back

if that makes sense at all

Posted

Make sure the hole is `flat` , so its not pulled out of shape ,because the clip needs a good flat seat .If its distorted the `V` shape part of the clip will just spring out
Now,, there is one model of car and Im  trying to find out which, one of the late TR`s, which has a push in plastic plug and the door card clips ino that. So will be trawling the Stoneleigh guys
Theres a chap that is always there, he bought most of BL stuff up when it closed he may be the best.... a thin featured older guy

Posted

Agree with the suggestion of checking the 'flatness' of the whole.  If you can, try and determine whether the entire clip is going in to the hole - if not that could be your problem.  Maybe remove the clip from the panel and see if the clip by itself will stay firmly in the hole.

Any chance of 'working the metal' around the hole with some pliers in order to try and make a smaller hole?

Gorilla tape could work.

If you find the hole is flat, and you can't make it smaller, try and see if you can wrap some tape or something (like silicone that would try semi-hard) around the clip to try and make the existing clip a smidge bigger.

jb

Posted

A more fundamental question to ask is why the interior panel is springing ourwards in the first place: it should lie flat against the door.
Is this a replacement trim panel by any chance?

I would take it off the car and see if it lies flat on the workbench.  If it doesn't, (and it's new) return it to the supplier for a replacement.  If it isn't new, use some judicious weights to flatten it off the car.

If it does lie flat when off the car but springs when on the car, the problem is not with the clip that is springing, but with the clips either side; I suspect that one or more clips are not correctly aligned with the holes in the door so that they are effectively pressing the sides of the trim panel in towards the middle, causing it to spring away from the door. Fettle the outer holes in the trim panel (not the door!) so that the clips line-up correctly without flexing the panel.

Posted

2875 wrote:
Ah, you mean fossick!


Quite possibly, but I always understood that to fossick is to rummage, or root around looking for something unknown that may or may not be there. Such as--I have been fossicking in the undergrowth today, but found nothing.

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