So this weekend i went ahead and changed out the actuators in my driver door and rear passenger door. The rear one is working fine however the driver one im having a weird issue. The doors lock and unlock fine if i use the door controls however sometimes the door won't unlock from the outside using the key. I dont have a remote only a key so before i replaced it i was able to unlock all the doors by turning the key twice however now that doesn't happen. Inside the driver door there are two rods one for the door handle and one that connects to the lock which turns when you put the key in the door. Im able to lock all the doors from the driver side by using the key but when i try to unlock it is as if the rod isn't long enough to turn the assembly far enough to unlock it which is odd considering it is the same entire lock assembly that was in the car before...anyone else have this issue?

 

Also another weird thing initially i wasn't able to unlock or lock the driver door from the outside until i adjusted the cable however i am not able to adjust to make it any tighter now. Also im still able to unlock all the doors if i turn the key twice on the passenger side

 

This weekend i think im going to go ahead and take it apart and try to shorten the end of the cable that goes into the actuator and hopefully that should make it work, its just odd that it worked fine before and the replacement actuator is physically the same as the oem one so the lock rod should be able to move it enough to unlock it but it literally needs to move like another 1\8 of an inch or so to fully unlock it

 

cable has a length adjustment near the **** end.
The rods have no adjustments but if assembled incorrectly you can have a length/travel issue.

Salim

 

i already adusted it near the **** end...and the rods are in there the right way from what i can see. I believe the only way that im going to fix this is if i mess with the cable end that attaches to the little hole in the lever of the actuator

 

hmm .. it is the same cable with 2 end points. The adjustment is on the **** end and you will not accomplish something different by jury rigging the other end. I would suggest just disconnect the cable and see if the rods work right. Once that is done, try rerouting the cable so that there are no kinks.

Sorry can't be of more help. There was a non-ituitve crazy flip in rebuilding the actuator.

Salim

 

The rod is working properly...i can physically see it moving when i turn the key and the lock latch moves as well just not enough to fully unlock the door. With the assembly out of the car and the cable still connected i can move the rod by hand and watch the door lock and unlock. I adjusted the cable up near the lock latch initially because at first i couldn't lock or unlock the door so after adjusting it now i can lock it but that doesn't do me any good. Honestly if it was the other way around where i could unlock but not lock it by turning the key i would just leave it alone. Well anyway i will look at it some more and figure it out eventually i guess. Or just go get a remote made and not worry about it

 

Well a little update on this i ended up buying a entire assembly that includes the lock, cables, etc. off of ebay for a little over $100 and threw it in and now it works fine. For some reason with the old assembly the lever that moves the actuator arm up and down wouldn't move down far enough to unlock when i used the key. Kinda weird but for some reason that happened.