F430 Door Panels - removal

Hello All

First time greetings from a F430 owner in sunny Australia.

I took the toy out today for a fang.
Hot ugly day in the sunny place so good for some spirited driving with the A/C on.

When I closed the driver’s door the window stayed down about 10mm as usual, but then would not go back up.

After some investigation I noticed the external door opener did not retract properly. It appears this device is somehow spring loaded to close flat and my spring has gone on holidays. The handle staying 5mm up keeps the window down. The door also appeared to catch somewhat on the striker plate. I adjusted the striker plate down about 1mm and the catch performed well but the external handle is still slightly raised. I will revisit this striker plate adjustment in case it is more a factor of the door sagging. These big heavy door place a lot of strain on hinges.

So I thought - just remove the door inner trim and attack the thing. I have done this on lots of cars ... but the F430 is a different beast. There are a few screws in the front edge, a couple under the door. I went onto Aldous Voice and he had photos of removing a 360 door trim and I am sure they are similar. But has anyone here removed the driver’s door trim on a F430 and not stuffed up the clips or leather. The rest is just mechanical and that is basic but I am very concerned about my beautiful black leather trim.

Inspiration and watchpoints please.

T

 

Well here’s a new twist to the broken door cables story and problems with external door handles.

My F430 (drivers side) outside door handle (RHS - Australia) started being difficult to operate. It resisted opening and would release with force. The outside handle sat up a bit from the normal parking position. And the handle itself appeared to be getting loose and wobble from side to side.

From all the discussion on various web sites I assumed I had a broken or breaking cable or “dodgey” lock. I then thought that maybe there was an arm from the external handle to the locking mechanism that had come loose. There was only one way to find out, and that was to get into the door cavity.

I have read various ways to dismantle the door hardware and that was a great help but when I went to do it I found my F430 door furniture is slightly different from the examples. Being Right Hand Drive mine does not have an inside grab handle on the door and it took me a while to decide to peel up the little rubber pad at the bottom of the well on the inside door handle. It is not obvious but under there are two screws that hold down the handle surround and locate the door card to the door frame and a third screw that holds the door card in. Do not try to pry up the plastic well or you will crack it or damage the leather surrounding it.

So I removed the hardware and the door card (some shoving required), peeled back the dust cover and started to investigate. The first thing I noticed is that the various cables appeared to be perfect. I started checking all the door locking operation and that appeared OK. At this stage I found a strange looking nut in the bottom of the door. I put it aside. The problem with this area is access and visibility, which is close to zero. I got a tube-light and a mirror and checked what happens behind the scenes when you pull-up the outside handle, but you can’t really see what is going on so the handle and mechanism had to come out. I did not see any benefit in removing the door lock itself and that proved correct. This is a tricky procedure best suited to a contortionist but after about 30 minutes I had the whole assembly out. Make sure you are using metric allen keys.

I did not know what I was looking for but in operating the thing it quickly became apparent that a pivot bolt that passes through this bracket was missing. I located my mysterious nut and it fitted in one side of the bracket. So there had to be more, but there was nothing to be found inside the door. I looked everywhere and eventually using a torch found the second bit hiding inside the side collision intrusion bar in the door cavity. Using a bit of wire I pulled it back out. I put it back through the bracket screwed on the nut and it worked. But I was not happy with its operation, it just did not seem right. A bit of detective work and observation of its operation showed that when the bolt fell out of this bracket the return spring moved in the frame. How I was putting it back together was not correct for the spring location. I took it apart again, relocated the spring and did up the nut. It then worked like a new one. Its operation should be smooth. In my photo I only show it assembled the wrong way. The end of the spring should sit in the little notches on the arm. There is a plastic guide that clips in place that stops the handle “flopping around”. I had to lightly glue this back in place as it had lost its tension and I felt it would fall out easily and the outside handle would then flop about.

So I cleaned all I could and carefully reassembled everything. It took three goes until I was happy with the way the triangular rubber seal sits under the door handle. I checked the operation of everything and was happy to now refit the door card. A few arguments with the door card as it did not want to go back on. This stage does need two people to make it easy on yourself and to minimise the risk to the leather trim. I adjusted the inside door release cable and put the cover back on.

Tried the door and it worked a treat. Opens and closes smoothly.

I cleaned all the leather with Swiss Vax cleaner and them massaged some Leather milk into the door trim and wiped it all clean. The whole job took me about 5 hours. If I had to do it again I reckon it would take me 2 hours max.

So if your doors are getting hard to open then check the operation of the outside handle. If it wobbles from side to side a bit then I would suspect this bolt is coming loose rather than cables breaking.

I have some photos of this but cannot locate them at present. I will find them and add them later.