Lubricating sliding door

[waltraud]

Lhd 83 westy- sliding door difficult to open. All locks, mechanisms etc work. I think it's probably under lubricatef or I've used the wrong grease? I'm planning to clean all rollers and locks .

What is best to use- lithium grease, light oil, other....,,thanks. I'm going to get that easy click shut feeling back!

[Hacksawbob]

The door may need to be adjusted depending on where it's sticking. it's a lot of faff to adjust and Ideally its a two man job.

[Plasticman]

before touching anything , does the door when shut, fit well, gaps nice , swages line up,its flush with adjoining bodywork. if yes then mark and positions of bolts etc before touching them.
you know how to remove door from middle track and sit on a stand or something , easy one handed job, clean the rollers of all the gunk and crap, smerar of gear oil is all i use , each have there own ideas, I dislike grease as its a magnnet for grit and other crud.
top guide i wash the channel with a rag in degreaser etc, then very light oil and wipe excess off
bottom thios is a lot of the problem , get a scraper/knives whetever and remove all the gunge thats in there if you want to do the bottom rollers then support door and unbolt and remove anbd clean, same as middle i wipe guide with gear oil, should glide nice now if all your bearings are fine,
mm

[ghost123uk]

For cleaning all the crud from the runners, esp the bottom one, I found that and old towel soaked in "white spirit" (£1 a Litre ) was good. Use plenty of it, it's a good de-greaser and leaves a nice protective oily coat behind.

[CovKid]

During the winter months I only have oil on these mechanisms (thoroughly cleaned first). I find that as the temperatures fall, grease seems to slow down the springy nature of the catches making it difficult to open, or more commonly close the slider. I suppose it could be partly due to wear and tear but certainly when I switched to oil in the winter months, the problem went away. Food for thought anyway.

[waltraud]

Excellent ideas chaps- thank you very much . I shall try this out in the snow. NB my Michelin Agilis M&S tyres 195 14C on carat alloys work a treat in the snow! Hoping to move onto Mefros next year!

[waltraud]

Cleaned out and re-lubed all joints, might now replace the spring on the sliding door rear hinge for extra springiness. Have just used Dynax s50 wax on the background for rustproof.

Pre and post masking pics

ImageUploadedByTapatalk1361109599.493924.jpg

ImageUploadedByTapatalk1361109614.441305.jpg

I have rubbed down the ridge for the slider with sandpaper and used light grease but wondered if using candle wax or similar would protect it from rusting?