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well good evening folks and welcome back
to the farm if you stumbled across this
video thinking you're gonna learn about
how to fix the uh stuck door latch on an
f-150 you're definitely in the right
place so typically we talk about lots of
farming stuff homesteading stuff
permaculture prepping survival all that
kind of stuff but today
today we've got real problems with the
wife's pickup and i say today it's been
a recurring issue this is our 2013 f-150
with a five-liter engine four-wheel
drive crew cab
and we bought this truck brand new
and ever since we bought it brand new it
has had an intermittent problem and that
problem is that this passenger side
rear door
the uh the lock assembly sometimes when
you
hit the unlock button
right you can hear things happening in
there you can hear the actuator
but that that locking mechanism the
linkage is somehow hung up in there
and it's preventing that door from
opening now
i thought okay i'm going to go online
and i'm going to find the solution this
problem because i've got to fix this and
i'll show you why this is mission
critical here in a second but i'm going
to fix this now i found hundreds
hundreds of forums with thousands
of you know
threads on there
speaking specifically to this issue now
there's a couple of different issues it
might be there's a door actuator down
here that actually controls everything
that locks and unlocks
there's also a wiring harness in here
where it could have some broken wires
or there could be this mystery thing
that just keeps the linkage depressed
even though the actuator's still cycling
even though the wires are still in place
something's still jamming up in here
and that's what's going on with ours is
the wiring is in place because we can
hear the actuator fire
and uh when this is freed up
you know the actuator goes up and down
100 of the time right it'll just this is
just a rare thing that happens
and it just by fortune happened to
happen here this evening when i come to
actually work on this
so i mean it's you know pretty rare you
actually can get in the shop and have a
problem be repeated and that's why i
think so many folks have had issues
taking these things to the dealer is
because
once they force that latch up they can't
get this problem to reoccur for another
60 or 90 days well here i got it to
happen so what i'm going to do is i'm
going to get the key in the ignition i'm
going to roll the windows down
and you'll be able to see what's
actually happening on this side then
we're going to disassemble the door the
door panel and take a look inside there
and see if we can't actually
troubleshoot and come up with a solution
for this problem so i got all my windows
rolled down
and you can see now
the actual latch whatever you call this
the pull the pull thingy right
why is this mission critical
well folks what's right here
this is the car seat for our
three-year-old daughter
my wife's currently like seven and a
half months pregnant and so very very
soon on the other side of this truck
there's gonna be a second car seat
you cannot have kids stuck in the car
that's the
never mind the fact your wife's gonna be
unhappy about that that's just straight
up dangerous
so
you know you hit the ditch or something
like that and you need somebody to get
your kids out and
the door doesn't latch
so or it doesn't unlash so what do you
got to do you guys smash the window out
or do something crazy like that in the
heat of a moment
but anyways so
this this knob sticks down
and
if you pull really really hard you're
able to get it up
that's not a
erectile dysfunction joke either but
anyways so yeah it sticks and even now
like it's hard to depress right it's
hard to depress
so it was hard to get up it was hard now
it's hard to get down
this is not normal i got the key fob
here now by the key with it's got the
built-in fob and everything right on it
we're gonna hit the lock button
and you can see it pulls it down
pull it up
but i should be able to freely
up and down and up and down right so
that tells me
that
it tells me my wiring inside my door is
fine
that tells me that the actuator motor
is fine
there's something in the linkage in this
door assembly
that's wrong so that's what we're going
to tear apart today now really really
easy to do that you're just going to
open this there's a little panel in
behind here that you're gonna have to
pull off
and then we'll pull these this panel
right here
there's gonna be a bolt right there
and then there's two bolts down in the
base of the door right there and there
that we're gonna pull
so this one here i'm not entirely sure
how i'm going to get in behind there but
i think i've got my little
my little prying tool i'll be able to
pop that off
same with this one now
for the folks at home
this is what i have
right this is not the right tool but
this is the tool that i have
you can buy actual trim removal
tools that are
meant for this purpose and they're
fairly cheap to get
but
i'm
at home on the farm
it's nine o'clock at night
and it's 40 below outside so i'm not
running to town to go do anything to get
anything like this i'm just going to use
the tools i have and be very very
careful now when i say it's 40 below
outside that's the reason why we're in
the shop the truck's been in the shop
for several hours to warm up and
acclimate because if i try to do
anything with this plastic at these
temperatures
well you can just imagine this this
would just all turn to dust right so
be bad news bears
so when you're looking in behind your
door handle here you're going to open
this up and right in the back at the
very bottom there's gonna be a place you
can insert
your little tool
you're gonna reach back in there
and pry forward and pop this little
panel off right in here now of course i
need both my hands to do this so
unfortunately i will be able to show you
exactly how it works well maybe if i'm
lucky i'll be able to show you how it
works but so i got my little tool in
there
and then you see that pops out it's not
broken that's just come unclipped
and then you can see
in there the eight millimeter
bolt that's there now that one's eight
millimeters
the one that's in behind here is going
to be six mil
and the ones down the bottom there
are also six millimeter
so now that we got this piece removed
out of the door latch i'm just gonna set
that down in the door pocket so i don't
lose it and we'll come up here to this
side piece
and we're going to go ahead
and just insert a little pop come up
and you can see pops free
there you go
and right there should be a six
millimeter bolt
so now that i got the trim off of there
and the little pocket off of here
i'm still gonna pull this piece around
this switch
so i want to insert my tool right there
very very carefully
and then we're going to pry that up
and then we're going to come to this
corner
and pry up again
and then we're going to disconnect the
wiring harness that's underneath this
switch so i went and got a smaller
flat bladed screwdriver just because
it's a little bit easier than my prying
tool to get into here
so we'll
pop that
and then i want to come to that corner
there
and do the same thing
there you go
pop that free
and you can see
right here the wiring harness with the
tab
so excuse me
you can just basically squeeze this tab
and pop that wiring harness completely
free and then i will set this switch
assembly aside so that nothing gets
dirty or damaged or anything like that
so it's interesting about these f-150s
and i don't think it was this model year
because this is a this is a 2013 but
this this body style was
2009-2014 and i think it was the body
style afterwards
that there's actually a 5.3 million
dollar class action lawsuit against ford
specifically for
door actuator issues and so i was going
to mention earlier is that ford is
really renowned for having
quite crappy door seals and you know
these ones here
you know they they leaked and constantly
they would pull down this one here same
thing right like it it'll just pull
right off of there you can see over here
the door seal pulls away really really
easily
and here in northern alberta
we get really really cold temperatures
you get any kind of moisture or humidity
in here say it's coming in out of the
shop or you get a chinook or something
like that but weather fluctuations you
get moisture against between the seal
and the actual surface of the door when
you go to open the door it tears the
seal away
and then inadvertently you can end up
with moisture coming down here
getting into the door
and either going down on the inside of
the window
or
over here
in this big old pocket this big old
corner of the window here is just a
complete water hole
and what happens
is down here at the base the door
if this doesn't drain properly
well this will fill up with water
and freeze your door actuators which as
you can imagine is a real gem so now
maybe when you're working on this just
like this it's nine o'clock at night and
and the shop you know in town the
hardware store's not open and you don't
have
a metric wrench to pull these bolts off
well have i got good news for you
eight millimeter six millimeter
i don't have that either
eight millimeter standard crossover is a
5 16
and a 6 millimeter
is a quarter inch so that's pretty you
know it's gonna fit so get the eight
millimeter on there take that one off
right above the door do that one first
and then we'll move up and do one
two
three
and this door will just lift right off
of there
so i got all my bolts out and i'm just
going to go ahead and lift up
and you can see the whole door panel
slides apart
and then
this is the door latch assembly
right here now you may want to remove
that depending on what you're trying to
accomplish
for the purposes of this
uh i will
likely have to remove it there's going
to be on the inside here a couple of
green tabs i'm going to have to squeeze
to pop this cable assembly off so this
is what i'm talking about here you see
there's a couple of green tabs on either
side
what you can do is reach in there
with a small set of needle nose pliers
and squeeze your tabs
and that should pop that out
and then you can pull that out and back
free your cable
and then pop that up and out
and then hey presto
you got full control of your door panel
now you're going to want to set that
aside again somewhere clean somewhere
you can't get damaged
because you're going to want this thing
to go on as easily as possible so now
this is what you're going to see once
you remove your door panel there's going
to be this very thick layer of plastic
that covers all of the nonsense that's
inside there that's really there to
protect it so again very similarly we're
going to want to remove a piece of this
or a portion of this we're not going to
cut anything out or anything like that
but we are going to peel it off and fold
it back out of the way but we're going
to be as careful as we possibly can
because
we want this to go back in place now
this is the rod here that's in question
you can see
that you can even right there it got
stuck a little bit right
but that's what we want to figure out is
what's underneath here
that's causing that issue so
this is held on by some
i don't even know what this product is
but it's really really sticky
so we're just gonna carefully
peel that away
and same down here until we open this up
enough so we can actually see what's
going on in there
so now with the plastic removed here you
got a pretty good
open view of things so you can see
the actual push rod the linkage assembly
and then we're just to sneak inside here
and you can see
this is the actual actuator here
so you can see when i trigger it
locks
unlocks
locks unlock so it is functioning as
it's intended
so what i'm going to do
is i'm going to apply a little
lubrication therapy
to that actuator
and then even to the push rod itself
we'll make sure
that it's adequately lubricated because
if there's anything hanging up there i
mean you can see it looks a little bit
beat up right
so i don't know how something like that
gets beat up
but uh
we're going to want to rule that one out
as a potential cause i should actually
mention too for the folks that we're
having issues with uh potential wiring
we come in and we look at that actuator
you'll see right off the side of it
there
that's where that harness is
and it's those wires right there
when you look at it there there almost
seems to be
you know there's not a lot of room to
play right so maybe they're under a
little bit of tension
and any kind of vibration or you know
rough service it's feasible
that those wires could uh definitely
pull out of that harness
and be in rough shape now as you can
imagine if i want to lubricate this push
rod here
and get it all the way down to the
actuator down there you can see kind of
right here it comes down and then it
kicks off at a 45 and then there's
another 45 and then it goes down to the
actual actuator and it's protected by
all of this nonsense so that's a little
bit hard to get to so i'm just going to
take my wd-40 can
and right on the linkage there on the
push rod i'm just going to start
applying
a little bit and just let gravity do
what gravity does
and take it down there for me i don't
want to
spray too much profusely in here
and end up
attracting dust and all kinds of things
because these doors aren't really sealed
very well right so
if i start getting a whole bunch of dust
in here that could lead to other issues
too
but if i can get that down to where it
needs to be we'll cycle this a few more
times
and then we'll reassemble the door
and uh and hopefully that solves their
problem
so full transparency i got in there with
some wd-40
and you know okay well i'm getting wd-40
in all the places
but
what i couldn't rule out
because
i mean this goes up and down
what i can't find on there is is a
friction point so i can't rule out
there's not something hanging up inside
the actuator itself
and i can't rule out the fact that when
i put everything back together
that something doesn't quite bind up and
and cause this to be an issue so what i
did is i actually got my grease gun out
a couple squirts on the end of my finger
and i just reached way back in there and
got very familiar with this rod
and just put a nice thin coating of
grease all the way on the rod all the
way down to the actuator and then with a
good dollop of grease
right where the actuator
cycles
i just
pop this up and down while pushing
grease in there with my finger
and uh we'll see we'll see if that works
that
i mean it should work right but yeah
we're at a point now where i can go
ahead and
put this plastic back on
and then get our door panel reassembled
and we'll be back in business and see if
see if this thing actually works this
stuff is still
it's pretty sticky right i should be
i'll just
put a little pressure to it
and it's going to stick there again so
i don't have to worry too much about
applying silicone or
any kind of
adhesive to this
if i just
apply a good bit of pressure
all the way down
and make sure it's stuck
in the same place
as where i took it off from
will be in good shape
i got my door panel here and you can see
the slots where it's going to sit
with all the tabs right they all sit in
these slots so i'm just going to go
ahead
and rest
the bottom tabs in those slots
and i'm going to get my cable my door
latch cable
and reinstall that so i insert it there
i pull back
and then
just apply a little pressure and that
should click right in
and then i want to because my bottom of
the door is already sitting in the tabs
it's going to go into
i'm going to lean the door in
to there and i'm going to pick up
and once i feel everything pop in then
i'm going to slide it down
the one thing that's mission critical
when you put this on and you slide into
the tabs is make sure that your actual
pull knob
is through this hole before you shunt
everything down
because otherwise that's going to cause
you grief so we've got the door panel
back on we're just gonna run down this
side make sure everything's aligned
which it is perfect
run down the other side make sure that's
aligned
which it is so that's perfect now we can
go ahead and reinstall our six
millimeter head screws
in the top of the door here
and in the base of the door panel and
then our eight millimeter head screw in
the rear of the door latch assembly now
if you're trying to get that six
millimeter head screw in there and it's
not quite lining up
you can just there's going to be a
little bit of movement here that you can
manipulate this a little bit so you kind
of got to hold your tongue the right way
just to make sure you get everything
where it's supposed to be so now that
we've got our bolts in here and in the
base of the door panel and up top here
we're going to go ahead and reinstall
the actual window switch which
real easy just a wiring harness clips
right in
nice clicking noise that's what we want
to hear
we'll go ahead front side first
then the back side
hey presto
bob's your uncle
so we want to install this last piece of
trim which goes right here before we do
that you can see there's metal tabs in
here top and bottom we just want to have
a quick look at those to make sure that
we didn't damage anything break any
plastic or bend anything before we go
ahead and reinstall
then
slide that right on there snap in the
bottom snap at the top check the bottom
again
there you have your door reinstalled so
we're going to put the key in the
ignition and roll the window up and see
if we can lock and unlock this a couple
of times
and uh hopefully this problem is
resolved
actually i think i don't need i don't
need to roll the windows up you guys
want to see this right so here's our uh
pull nut pull knob here
and
unlock lock
unlock
lock
unlock things seem to be doing what
they're supposed to be doing so
hopefully we've solved this problem
i'm just gonna depress that manually
hit the lock button
and then hit the unlock button that was
the only other thing i could find as a
common denominator is if this ever got
locked manually and then somebody hit
the lock button a couple of times
and then go to hit the unlock and it
would stick but it seems that it's not
doing that so
i think i'm going to go ahead and call
this problem solved check back in with
me in uh in a couple weeks
and i'll let you know how this all
played out now
if you found this helpful
well maybe i've got one more for you
because you probably own an f-150 you
probably got all the same problems i
have i also did a video on the sticky
tailgate latch a common problem with the
f-150s is you can pull on that and pull
on that and pull on that
and you're gonna get nowhere so there's
a video i did on how to adjust the
linkage and properly lubricate all your
moving parts inside your f-150 tailgate
for the 2009 to 2014 body style
now
further to that if you found this
helpful and you're also interested in
farming homesteading raising your own
food doing a little bit of prepping now
would be a really good time for you go
down below hit like hit subscribe hit
the notification bell
binge watch a whole bunch of our other
videos and uh
you might just uh you might just learn
something new that's helpful but it is
getting on close to i think 9 30 9 40
ish so it will be a really good time for
me to head inside the house and go fix
myself up a cup of tea so i'll let you
go for now i hope you have a fantastic
evening and we'll see you tomorrow
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you