Frozen Locks

[Pigemeister]

Hi,

Anyone have any ideas on what to do when you've just come out of doing a 12hr nightshift and you can't open the damn doors cause the door lock is frozen solid ???

I have a 95 Chimp, which has the silver disks that you press to let you in....... this morning these were frozen solid and even with my considerable weight and a good deal of antifreeze, refused to budge. I ended up leaving the damn car at work and getting a lift home.

Cheers

Chris

[ATG]

There is one way that is not elegant, but will work. Its not exactly rocket science, but seems to be taboo to mention it on an open forum. Have you got an e-mail address?

[RCA]

Not quite sure what this taboo is but what I did when this happened to me was defrost them with warm water and then put wd-40 in them, has not happened again!!

[JonRB]

I think ATG is referring to the secret way of getting into one's Chimaera that we don't talk about in public in case tea-leaves are reading (even though they probably know already).

[Nora]

I have a 97 Chim with the same locks and this keeps happening to me. What is the secret?

[Bob the Planner]

Nora,

The answer in best software support speak is "RTFM"

Bob the Planner

[philshort]

RTFM works when the FM refers to the car in question - does that ever happen?

I normally use warm water to free the door push. Not too hot, I'm not sure what thermal shock would do to the paint or bodywork. I will try WD40 to try to prevent it, I hadn't tried that.

Bit of an obvious problem to occur, looking at the surface area of the door push. No wonder they went to remote buttons - but those probably have just as many (more?) problems of their own.

Phil

PS at the end of a 12hr shift, if there's no kettle to be had, I'm not sure if I'd p*ss on my own car, but its always an option!

Edited by philshort on Wednesday 16th January 22:27

[ATG]

It's not in the manual is it ... ?

[philshort]

Getting in to the boot is in the manual, not sure about getting into the car. Thats just bloody obvious!

Phil

[Marlboro]

I had the same and used a silocone spray called SIL. They haven't frozen since.