Club 80-90 Forums

Annoyingly, my sliding door keeps opening for no apparent reason, I shut it again, push and shove it to make sure it's properly shut, off I go and it just opens again all by itself. Sometimes it does actually stay shut for the entire journey but it seems to be getting worse.

Any ideas what might be happening. Hope it's not a slightly pathetic ghost!

Something wrong with the catch?

Mine was the same and no mater how much adjusting i did, it still popped open. Although the catch looked ok on the door, i changed for a new one from VW (£28+vat). That solved the problem ok. Mines a 1990 with the later door not sure what type yours is.

The important part of the catch is the one at the back of the door, it wont close the latch at the front unless its fully closed at the back. Theres an adjuster near the front latch behind the door trim if needed. If you are able to lock the door in the closed position though, then it could be a faulty latch. Try moving the rear striker plate out a little (slacken the 2 allen bolts and move plate out slightly). May improve then hopefully.

Mine used to do this too, usually on the motorway

Try tightening the catch pin 1/4 of a turn, if it is tight try undoing slightly. Either way it will rotate any worn part on the pin away from the catch. It worked for me, been fine for months now.

once lost a weeks worth of food and a full set of cutlery on the a30 because ofthis! selling the van seemed to solve it

thanks chaps, I'll have a go at doing some adjusting, if that fails I'll get a new catch - not sure I'll resort to a selling just yet DD. What was the cutlery doing next to the door, mine lives in the drawer!

I did nearly loose a mate on the way to Glastonbury, he'd been leaning on it for most of the journey, he stopped leaning on it and a couple of minutes later open it went, wouldn't be as bad as loosing a weeks food though of course!

Fairly common, they pop open onto the second "safety" catch.
You can take it off, strip it, clean it and it will still do it, replace it with new and it won't do it again, even though you found nowt wrong with the one on it!

Ours used to open when hitting pot-holes etc. I tried lots of adjustments but eventually found that raising the lock post on the door pillar cured it.
It's been fine for nearly three years now.

Same here.on both my van and my brothers,sorted em both by adjusting the locating peg to the rear of the door,just slacken the peg its self (15mm) i think from memory,good idea to score around it so you know where you started from if your with me,quite a bit of adjustment on them.Just a case of try,try,try again.
James

Same here - Replaced rear centre catch on my 1989 T25 Caravelle with a new one and bob's your uncle .. sorted!

I also have come across the sort of problem and have found a way of fixing the fault with a decent engineers file ,a couple of small ball bearings and a vice.........

What tends to happen is the locking pawl wears due to 2 things, 1, lateral movement of the pawl on its spindle, which then wears the pawl locating edge its self ,this then leads to the latch mechanism releasing during any movement of the vehicle. The door wont fly open it will simply slip on to the 1st or saftey latch........

Once the complete catch mechanism is removed from the vehicle the take a close look at the locking pawl and the spindle on which it sits.

You will find lateral movement of the pawl on the spindle,,,,,,,this can be reduced by pressing the whole unit in a vice with the aid of the afore mentioned ball bearings (Bearings should be positioned in the reccess where the screws hold the unit to the vehicle)

Also the leading edge of the pawl needs to be inspected and then filed flat to remove any worn edges,,,,,

This may be a temporary fix but it buys you time to find a new one,,,,,,,So far mine has lasted 12 months since the fix...

Regards

Fritz,,,,,,,

Just had this problem myself and cured it as per T3teedub's post above by moving the post up.

Try this before you start parting with your cash.