Hi gang,

Let me begin todays tale of stupidity with a statement. I now feel that am
an expert on repairing broken 928 door handles.

After killing time at the Pepboys this morning buying stuff that had
absolutly nothing to do with fixing a door handle, I got home around
noonish and started the repair. I printed out the cheat sheets from the
Nichols site and set about following the procedures. (they are perfect -
thanks to those who wrote them) Note - I did not disconnect any of the
wires to the speakers, nor did I remove the mirror switches. After
removing all the bolts to the door panel, I lifted it onto a short stool
to prop it up and out of the way. This will prove significant down the
road. About one hour into the job I have already bolted in the new handle
and I am ready to test it. Right now I am really happy with myself for
cutting a 3 hr job down to 1 1/2 hrs. I clicked the latch at the end of
the door to the shut postiion with the door still open and lifted the
handle. Nothing. Jiggle a few more times. Nothing. I lifted the inside
handle and click, the latch opens. Now im confused. The new handle has
virtually no travel at all, so im thinging something is stuck. For the
next hour, im wiggling and giggling trying to figure why the door handle
has little to no travel and wont unclick the latch. In this hour i have
removed and installed the door handle at least twice thinking i dont have
it aligned right. Nothing works. What to do? Of course, unbolt the entire
door latch mechanism and lock tumbler and remove them from the door shell.
I disconnected everything except the 3 vacuum lines. I was able to fiddle
with the latch still connected to the lines. So now for the next hour im
fiddling with the latch over and over and over again, getting more
frustrated by the moment because i cant make the outside door handle lever
arm unclick the door latch. The inside handle worked every time. Why, why
WHY!!!! ARGGGHHH!!!!. At this point its about 3 o'clock and i'm no closer
to getting this fixed since the day it broke. Im also getting dizzy and
lightheaded from the heat and no food save for a Slim Fast and a cup of
coffee i had for breakfast 6 hours earlier. I broke 1/2hr for lunch and
lots of water. Feeling refreshed i went back to it with Roling Rock in
hand, hoping for some Eureka moment that unfortunatly never came. More
fiddling and swearing and about 4:30 i decided to give up and order a
whole new latch mechanism since this one is obviously never going to work
no matter what i do. I have never wanted to sell my car untill today. In
fact i havnt been this stressed over fixing something since that 15 day
temp tag fisaco when i bought the car. I'm thinking this because I have
scheduled a PCA tech inpsection on Tuesday for Fridays Frenzy DE. I'm
never gonna make it time cause I'm getting screwd by a door handle that
broke the day before my first scheduled inspection a week ago!!!! Life
sucks, yada yada, im never gonna get this car fixed in time, yada
yada...Drink more beer. Ok, so now im putting it all back together again.
BAM! Now the door lock aint working. None of the door handles work now. I
must have put it all in wrong or a$$backwards. Now i have to dissassemble
everything yet again. Summoning the courage to not slash my wrists with
the utility knife in my tool box, I played with everything untill i
figured out how the lock works and how i could reassemble everything so
that it would work. Another half hour later, misson accomplished. The key
works, the door unlocks and i can open it again from the inside. Knowing
that i will at least be back where i started from i put the door pieces
back together. Next crisis. The anti theft plate will not go back in. Why
me lord, Why me! Cause - The new innner door handle mech i got is a newer
updated piece and has extra material cast into it on the bottom for
whatever reason i cant figure. The plate is not cut out for the extra
material on the mechanism. What the heck, I cant get into it from the
outside anyway, I threw it in the tool box. Got the rest of the door put
back together without a hitch except the can of spray adhesive i bought
this morning left the factory without a pushbotton nozzle. Great, sort
sums up my day anyway, so i taped the plastic back up. I got everything
back together perfectly. Looks great, it back together and i have no extra
parts or screws, except that plate.

Ok now heres the payoff. Now done, I shut the car door. Just to be sure
that it still doenst work, i lift the handle and BAM!

It friggin WORKED!!!!!

I had heart failure right on the spot. I got up off the groung and did it
again. It still works. And much better than it ever did too. I can now
open the door with one finger. Now the reason for me not disconnecting
anything being significant is that with all that stuff hanging there i
wasnt about to shut to door and risk damaging the door panel buy getting
it caught in the door just to test a door handle. It should work the latch
no matter if the door is open or closed right. WRONG!!!!

How stupid can one man be? Pretty darn stoopid! If I had only shut that
darn door to test the handle...I had the freaky thing fixed the first time
and didnt even realize it untill 4 1/2 hrs and many parts removed and
replaced unnecessarily later. I managed to turn a 3 hr job into a 1.5 hour
job and back into a 5 1/2 hr job and effectivly ruining any chance i had
to tackle a few more items on my check list like that hood latch. Good
thing Sunday is another day.

I'm bleeding brakes. Wish me luck. :-0

John Krawczyk
1979 928 AT/LSD
69k miles

But I am interested to know if there's anything you can do to prevent door handle failure.

I've not read John Krawczyk's write up, that's just too long and I have a brake line to sort out