Central locking woes.......round three :S

I am now fixing my third door lock on my vRS (drivers door this time). I fixed the two rear ones in January and since Monday the drivers has been paying up.

I have striped down and begun to rebuild but for the love of god I cant get the damn rod with the chrome tip pack through the ancillary carrier without having 8 arms to hold and juggle every thing.

I have actually broken the loop in the plastic seat for the rod to sit in my plan is to dismantle the broken lock and fit the unbroken seat onto the new lock.

so my question is could I just leave the rod assembly off, blank it off on the door card and put a grommet in the ancillary.

I know skoda did this with the facelift mk1 for the back doors without changing the locks.

I'm thinking of putting a chrome bolt in the hole on the door card/s (so it looks like they are locked constantly. thoughts peeps?