1980 Mercedes door won't close properly

Factual Questions
1

OK, a bit of a specific question, but the Doper community is so rich in knowledge, who knows?

I have a 1980 Mercedes sedan and recently one of the doors recently developed a quirk where it won’t close properly. It’s secure (doesn’t fly open around corners), and it locks OK, but the door itself doesn’t seat into the body of the car. If you push it, it goes where it’s meant to, then just pops back when you release the pressure.

Any thoughts? Anyone encountered this before? Or do I have to go to a garage!

Thanks

MRR

2

Sounds like the door has been pushed backward when open and the hinges are sprung or bent out of normal.
Thus extra force is required to push into proper place and the door springs outward as far as the latch will permit.

3

Some cars have a plastic sleeve on the part of the door’s latch that meets the striker post (the peg on the car’s door frame that the latch engages). If the sleeve is badly worn or has fallen off, that could cause this type of problem. Carefully compare the affected door’s latch to the other doors to see if this is the case. If so, replace the missing/worn sleeve.

In some cases, adjustment of the striker post is all that is needed. Most of the time, however, the striker post itself hasn’t migrated, and adjustment just compensates for wear or misalignment in something else. But if the problem is minor, the adjustment is sufficient to address the problem.

Sometimes you can get an idea of the nature of the problem by closing the door with the outside handle/button/whatever pulled/pushed/whatever as if you were opening the door. Don’t lift or pull on the door, just let it approach the door frame naturally. Look for any sign that it is misaligned in the up/down and fore/aft dimensions. If it doesn’t nestle nicely into the door frame, you might have something sprung as mentioned above. In that case, a visit to the dealer or a body shop would be called for.

4

Might take it to a body shop rather than a dealer. Body shops should have plenty of experience dealing with stuff like that.

5

[QUOTE=Gary T]
Some cars have a plastic sleeve on the part of the door’s latch that meets the striker post (the peg on the car’s door frame that the latch engages). If the sleeve is badly worn or has fallen off, that could cause this type of problem. Carefully compare the affected door’s latch to the other doors to see if this is the case. If so, replace the missing/worn sleeve.

Thanks spingears and Gary T - I’ll check it out today. Appreciate your input.

M