Boot handle failure (solved)

Here's a tale with a happy ending on my 04 Octavia estate. I didn't find a solution on the interweb (although these forums helped) so I thought I'd record it for posterity and any other unfortunate souls who hit the the same thing.

It all started with the boot occasionally failing to catch when I closed the lid. Lifting the handle and shutting appeared to work. Then the problem progressed - when I opened the boot, the handle didn't flip back to it's normal position so we got into the habit of easing it back. Then came the biggie... the boot was unlocked but wouldn't open (could hear the lock moving with central unlock). A hard push of the handle back into it's slot followed by a hard squeeze on one side would just about open it.

At this point I was certain something was mechanically wrong and likely to cost money.. so off came the Internal boot trim (easy) and out came lock mechanism. Except it didn't .. bottom of the three bolts had seized and had to be drilled out. Then I got a look at thing - there was a fair bit of corrosion and after a bit of playing, it was clear that one of the handle pivots was simply jammed with rust. Wire wool and WD40 got it moving again but it was clear the handle would fail again. Ebay was my friend, picked up a new part for £20 more than 2nd hand, felt it was worth it for a clean piece. Popped it in, connected up and sorted .. except the lock barrel was still in the old handle. Fair bit of corrosion there as well and the tight tolerance meant it wasn't coming out easily. One junior hacksaw later ... I simply made two cuts along the length of the plastic barrel casing removed a section of the plastic and out comes the barrel. Cleaned it up and it's ready to pop in to the new handle tomorrow. Woohoo problem solved.

So if you came here looking for a solution to a stiff or non-working boot handle but your central locking is still working - that's what I found and how I fixed it.

Cheers

Rob