Door Removal

One of my projects this winter is the rebuilding of my doors, new window and door seals as well as anything else that needs repairing.

Garage is not heated so thinking to pull doors to the basement.

As a note one door has had the pins replaced by what appear to be bolts.  This door drops a little when opened so that needs to be addressed.

Best to take the doors off at the hinges or remove with hinges or is this going to create more issues and better to just hold off till warmer weather?

The hinges are riveted to the doors. You unbolt the hinges from the body and they stay with the doors. I've heard of people drilling out the rivets in the door and replacing them with nut/bolt combos, but haven't tried it.

It's easy to take the doors off with a helper. I did that when working in the interior because it made it easier to move around the truck and not worry about the doors being in the way.

Great, that's what I was hoping to hear, taking off all that old seal material off the door does not look like fun but should be easier to get at on a flat surface.

Any input on the hinge situation?

Wiggle the hinges up and down to see if the pins are loose. Replacement pins, regular and oversized, are available from Macs Auto Parts. If the pins seem solid, the sag may be in the door itself. The door skin metal is not particularly sturdy, and after 50 years of people climbing in and out using the door for support, they start to sag.

It seems a little cave man, but one effective remedy is to grab the door by the back edge and force it up and forward. It takes a fair amount of force; a big lever or a strong friend is helpful, but you can bend it back into position where it closes properly. I did it to the driver door on my '65 pickup.

Of course, only do this if the pins are tight. I did pins first and still had to resort to bending....

Heck I've removed and installed doors myself. Really nothing to it. If the "caulking seal" is still around the hinges where they go into the body, it helps to remove that first.

Came right off, so now to the door rebuild.

Anybody got any tips on removing 55 year old rock hard door seals?

Razor knife to get the bulk off. Wire wheel, either on a drill or a die grinder. Gonna have to prime and repaint the area.

After some trials I found the best way to remove, just use the heat gun to get the seal warm and then wax and grease remover for the adhesive.

Once I got that understood it took maybe an hour per door, no scratches and about 95% of the seal adhesive is gone, very pleased, will ad a picture.


Question, door seals, anybody have any experiace with the replacement seals at around $125 per set vs just a generic EPDM "D" shape foam seal at around $20 per set.

Considering the condition of the original 55 year old rock hard seals I question what I am gaining for the extra cost!

I just used Tim Brogan's complete kit. Had all the window and door seals.

Okay. There's a reason that the door seals are made as they are. The factory style seal will seal better, retain it's shape, and not distort over time. Or you can hack it with the D shaped foam seal. Your call.

CARPENTERS DOOR SEALS ARE JUNK!!!!!!!!!!!! Tim fixed them!!!!!!!!!! Short time ago, brand new set of CArpenters junk which was stressing the hinge same as stressing house door hinges.... The eyebrow area of them will NOT COMPRESS correctly which puts a strain on the hinge AND the door pillar!!!  Replaced them with Tim's and bingo,,,  
 HOWEVER you need to adjust the door gaps while you have the hinges apart... I have wrote this up a LONG TIME AGO,,  but not everyone got it and or listens???????????? There isnt enough gap in there to use shims and not the correct way anyways,,,, its easy to do the correct way as you need to take the hinge apart anyways,,,,,, Here is a picture that gives you the idea of how.  You move the door forward or rear ward by bending that hinge, top hinge for the top of the door and bottom hinge for the bottom of the door,,, (duh),,,,,,, Makes no difference which door as the process is the same.
 The door SHOULD NOT USE THE latch on the frame to move the door up or down and you need to pretend its not there and or take it off. The door should align with the body WITHOUT USING the latch as a crutch!!!  Look at your door gap and decide which direction the door needs to move to for the gap to be equal...  and like doing a house door one direction pivots against the other hinge direction. Using both hinge bending to set the door exactly correct WITHOUT A CRUTCH......  NO BETTER time than now as you have the hinges apart anyways,,,,, LOL.....





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Tim Brogan's email??

Saw it on another post but cant find now,

I believe it's EconoUSAparts@fuse.net. You can also send him a note using the message function on here. His screen name is econoUSAparts.

So as the door rebuild continues at some point in the past it looks like someone installed a hex head bolt into the hinge.

It seems to be working but I wonder if the internals may be damaged such that a regular hinge pin could not be installed due to the threads.

Leave is alone?

If it's solid and the hinge works like it should, I'd say leave it alone. However, Macs does sell oversized pins if you want to drill it out.

One of my hinges was in sad shape so I drilled it out a bit and used a metal bushing as a sleeve to match the stock hinge pin. It's working so far. Just another alternative...