Getting a handle on things is what I am calling this one due to the plethora of handles Me and my daughter (our budding mechanic) just replaced. By now, if you have read any of the old posts, you know that my luck is just my luck. My dad’s name is not Murphy, but it very well could have been. We have older cars. That just comes with normal problems. We expect to be careful with things and to put in some extra time doing minor repairs. In this case, it is if both vehicles were following the grand conductor of the hit song “The ballad of the broken handles”.
The Truck
I came home from work the other day and noticed something strange on the kitchen counter. It was a long skinny black plastic piece that was in pieces from the truck. After a moment, I knew it was the inside handle of my old truck. Upon our next encounter, I asked,”So, which door was it?” I got a lovely story in return about the driver’s side door and how the handle just popped off that morning. Being one car down already, this was exactly the wrong news. Oh well, off to the wide wide world of web to, not only find the part, but watch a few videos to see if this is something we can tackle on our own. Sure enough it was, so I ordered what we needed (a nice upgrade from plastic to metal) and the price was excellent.
The Car
Round about the same week, both the passenger handle and the driver handle on the outside of the car broke internally. Same old song and dance. There were no upgrades to be had, but, I was able to find a factory branded set of outside handles for the car. Just in time, here comes the rain. After we scouted for a new Ark filled with all the little animals, we finally got a nice day, some time to do the work, and some sunshine.
The Work
We decided that since only one handle on the truck was in need and the replacement process only included one bolt that held the handle on, we should start with the truck. Of course the inter-web videos all made it look so much easier than it was. We ended up removing the inner door cover so we could easily get to the bolt. Thread locker gel made removal a bit challenging, but not impossible. As always, the first one takes 30 minutes, the next one took 5. For the sake of pacifying old Murphy, we went ahead and replaced both handles on the truck. It really went smoother than expected, so with the extra time, we tore into the car. This was a bit more challenging. Luckily the socket size was the same for every bolt. Also, the videos must have been on older models, because we found that the manufacturer left access holes for this job.
The interesting twist
We did have an interesting little issue where the bolt was ever so slightly too short to re-install. A quick old phone guy trick helped out. We took a tiny bit of wire and made a little clump. Then inserted this into the socket to allow the bolt to stick out just enough to get the threads to reach the hole. All of the handles on those two old vehicles are now in working order. I am so proud of my girl and how she was able to figure it out and fix all the things.