My sons fabia has a drivers door that does not lock with the key fob or manually inside. Ive read about faulty solenoids etc but thought i would ask you guys before stripping the door down. My son only realised yesterday that we bought this for him so hopefully we can work on it together until he passes his test, fingers crossed

Look for broken wires between A-pillar and door, I think as a first step. Don't be surprised if you find a blue/yellow or violet/yellow one busted. They are the drive wires to the dc motor (not solenoid) within the lock. They go through the white connector pair at the a-pillar.

12 minutes ago, Breezy_Pete said:

Look for broken wires between A-pillar and door, I think as a first step. Don't be surprised if you find a blue/yellow or violet/yellow one busted. They are the drive wires to the dc motor (not solenoid) within the lock. They go through the white connector pair at the a-pillar.

What the best way to find these wires? is it door panel off pete ?

No, these would almost certainly be broken (if they are) within the rubber boot/bellows between door and a-pillar, so unclipping this at the a-pillar to be able to inspect is the way forward.

 

The boot terminates wrapped around a white plastic frame at the pillar, and it's ideal if you can remove the boot with this white frame still attached to it.  You certainly want to reattach it before refitting as it's dead easy to fit boot to frame when frame isn't inserted into the a-pillar, but bloody awkward to get on properly when it is.  If that makes any sense at all!

 

The frame is held in place against the metalwork with four plastic ramp catches, two on each vertical edge. in theory, squeezing front and back vertical edges simultaneously towards each other will release boot plus frame, but access is limited unless you have tiny hands.

 

Image of catches on one side of frame: 

 

 

excellent mate really great advice,will take a look tomorrow 

well the first step is complete pete found a wire that was broken and re-soldered, but the problem is still there, the tiny red light flashes where the lock is but still nothing happens so its off with the door card,

Bit hard to see in that pic, but is that the violet/yellow going into the white connector? Was its blue/yellow neighbour definitely intact? Those are the motor drive wires. Did you unplug the white connector and check for corrosion on pins?

 

22 minutes ago, Breezy_Pete said:

Bit hard to see in that pic, but is that the violet/yellow going into the white connector? Was its blue/yellow neighbour definitely intact? Those are the motor drive wires. Did you unplug the white connector and check for corrosion on pins?

 

Sorry the purple in the left of the pic is the wire ive repaired, i didnt realise that the sockets could be at fault, is there a way of unpluging without taking the door off? was going to pop the door trim off and may be do some continuity checks 

There's a latch in the middle of the bottom edge of the white loom connector that needs pushing upwards, then grab all of that connectors wires and gently easy out.

Problem with lock wiring is that it goes through the metal inner carrier panel, no access to unplug from lock without unrivetting that panel.  You could 'pin-stab' the motor wires as close as poss to the door lock, on the accessible side of that panel, and buzz through to the white connector, taping up after?

 

will have a go in a bit,i guess its best to disconnect the battery 

Knowing how the car's wiring has been messed with, definitely.

 

A view of the door connectors with loom side all unplugged, white frame removed.

Yellow arrow shows where the latch locks into from the  white loom connector.

 

Door removal is pretty easy once all four connectors and door check strap are removed, by the way, if it might be useful.

Edited 16 August, 20223 yr by Breezy_Pete

Does the white plastic surround need removing first pete? mines the same as this one

soz pete just posted this thanks pal

Will be slightly easier access without the white frame in place, and you'll want to get that off anyway to refit the rubber to it properly before refitting both together.

Connector should be removable with white frame in place though.

 

 

well today we took the connectors out of the door frame and checked for corroded terminals.

There was a few terminals that looked corroded, especially the large black plug, so cleaned and scrubbed with wd40 and a toothbrush along with a small wire brush, not forgetting I already repaired the violet /yellow cable.

I plugged them  back in and checked, but it was exactly the same, i decided to take the panel off the door to take a closer look and realised that someone had been here before, when all the screws were off i lifted the door card off and the lock mechanism connector fell away, yes that's right it wasn't even plugged in, and at looking a little closer it looked like some one had pulled it off as the clip side had broken and as the rivet's were still intact i could see this was someone's attempt of a quick fix.

 

Unfortunately ive had to leave it for today as i go on holiday on Sunday and haven't got the correct rivet's to refit, but defo thinking its the lock mechanism.

 

whats your thoughts ??

Clip on that connector is often broken during removal as it's hard to see and reach, plus people not realising there's a technique to releasing these (push connector on while releasing latch until click is heard, then pull off).

May be a case of getting an intact connector and splicing it onto the existing wires.

 

7 minutes ago, Breezy_Pete said:

Clip on that connector is often broken during removal as it's hard to see and reach, plus people not realising there's a technique to releasing these (push connector on while releasing latch until click is heard, then pull off).

May be a case of getting an intact connector and splicing it onto the existing wires.

 

My train of thought was they had an issue with the door lock due to the cable i repaired or maybe the corrosion,but instead of looking there theve taken the panel off and realised that its pop rivited so decided to tug on the cable going through the plate to the lock mechanism,the pop rivits look original

Oh, I see. ☹️

Rivets are part number N91078801. They are big enough to be beyond the capability of most pliers-style riveters, so lazy-tongs or pneumatic type necessary really.

 

People have been known to use rivnuts to convert to screw-fitting, or even drill holes alongside the original biguns then use self tappers to remount. 

It's a job to know how much to change while the panel's off, lock?  window mech?, especially if rivetting back on.

 

I see you have two rivets missing, on a diagonal either side of the window motor, there are supposed to be ten in total around the perimeter.

 

See if you can see a date on that sticker on the steel panel, just near the window motor, to see if it's as old as the car or not. The missing rivets suggests it has been removed at some point. The panel almost looks a bit too clean to be the factory original?

 

 

 

Edited 18 August, 20223 yr by Breezy_Pete

5 minutes ago, Breezy_Pete said:

Rivets are part number N91078801. They are big enough to be beyond the capability of most pliers-style riveters, so lazy-tongs or pneumatic type necessary really.

 

People have been known to use rivnuts to convert to screw-fitting, or even drill holes alongside the original biguns then use self tappers to remount. 

It's a job to know how much to change while the panel's off, lock?  window mech?, especially if rivetting back on.

 

I see you have two rivets missing, on a diagonal either side of the window motor, there are supposed to be ten in total around the perimeter.

 

 

 

Cheers pal ive just ordered the rivits and gun, its the bigger 6.4 size with 2 handles could you tell me which ones need to be drilled out,maybe a pic,dont want to drill out the ones i dont need to, i told my son to order the new lock for the sake of £20 but he wants to wait and see lol, i'm hoping i can repair it maybe a dodgy micro switch fingers crossed,whats your take pal ?

See edit above about date on panel, that may affect decisions about what to replace.

These are the ten rivet positions:

 

 

think i may buy some hex self tapers lol what size you think pal ?