Full door alignment issues

RichStep

RichStep

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Joined
Sep 19, 2020
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31
Location
Chicago
While an avid reader of this forum, this is my first posting.
I purchased a hardtop and full doors for my 97 TJ - no issues with the top or passenger door but the driver's door sits a little high and is making for a hard close/open. A closer look at the clunking noise and it looks like the bottom of the latch is hitting against the anchor on the body (anchor? - not sure what it's actually called).

The door is all the way down but looking at the body lines, it looks like it should be or needs to be about 1/4" lower. Any suggestions to get it down would be greatly appreciated.
 
I needed a heat gun and impact to remove the hinge bolts, just an FYI. I don't believe the top body mount (windshield hinge) is adjustable, just the other 3.
 
RichStep said:
While an avid reader of this forum, this is my first posting.
I purchased a hardtop and full doors for my 97 TJ - no issues with the top or passenger door but the driver's door sits a little high and is making for a hard close/open. A closer look at the clunking noise and it looks like the bottom of the latch is hitting against the anchor on the body (anchor? - not sure what it's actually called).

The door is all the way down but looking at the body lines, it looks like it should be or needs to be about 1/4" lower. Any suggestions to get it down would be greatly appreciated.
Click to expand...
Are you referring to the latch loop on the body side, that can be loosened and moved for adjustment.
 
I loosened the hinge on the bottom of the door and immediately the door was adjustable. After adjusting and tightening, the door was still sagging, so slight pressure, vertically on the door revealed that the hinge pin was likely worn out and after removing it was pretty obvious, so I'm going to replace the pins to see if this fixes the issue. Update forthcoming.
 
DEValken said:
I needed a heat gun and impact to remove the hinge bolts, just an FYI. I don't believe the top body mount (windshield hinge) is adjustable, just the other 3.
Click to expand...

Hey, I know this is old, but any tips on using the heat gun to loosen the loctite that seems to be holding the things torx screws into place? How much heat? Just don't want to damage the paint or do anything stupid.
 
If I'm membering correctly, I was worried about heating the paint too much with the heat gun, so I heated the torx bit up and let it transfer down to the bolt.

There are threads here:

https://wranglertjforum.com/threads/stuck-windshield-hinge-bolts.38800/
and

https://wranglertjforum.com/threads/door-hinge-screws-a-variety-of-expletives.59255/
where more informed people than I have some tips. It needs to get hot at the threads to break the loctite bond. I think I also heated the ones I could from the inside.

The other (main?) concern is the contact surface between the underside of the countersunk head and the panel. Impact for sure (couple hard duggas).
 
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DEValken said:
If I'm membering correctly, I was worried about heating the paint too much with the heat gun, so I heated the torx bit up and let it transfer down to the bolt.

There are threads here:

[URL][URL]https://wranglertjforum.com/threads/stuck-windshield-hinge-bolts.38800/[/URL][/URL]

and

[URL][URL]https://wranglertjforum.com/threads/door-hinge-screws-a-variety-of-expletives.59255/[/URL][/URL]

where more informed people than I have some tips. It needs to get hot at the threads to break the loctite bond. I think I also heated the ones I could from the inside.

The other (main?) concern is the contact surface between the underside of the countersunk head and the panel. Impact for sure (couple hard duggas).
Click to expand...

Great, thanks very much.

Edit: Found one of my own old posts in that thread you shared. 🤦🏼‍♂️
 
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