[s-cars] 95 S6 door not opening from inside

[munrof]

Sean;

Based on your symptoms with the inner handle, you have water in the Bowden
cable from the inner door handle to the door latch. When you pull on the
inner handle, the you can move the cable through the frozen water but the
spring on the latch arm isn't strong enough to pull the cable back, so the
arm stays in the "release" position and the door won't latch. The inner
handle usually doesn't retract fully when this happens and if you "help" it
to retract it pops the cable sheath out of the retainer on the handle and
then the inner handle won't open the door once everything thaws out.
If this is the case, the water in the cable won't go away and will freeze
again once it gets cold enough. The solution is to thaw the cable and run
copious amounts of WD-40 through it to flush out the water. If you have to
remove the cable to do this, both the door panel and the complete window
carrier assembly have to be removed. It is possible to get the cable end off
the latch lever with the carrier in place, but dang near impossible to get
it back on - from what I recall anyway when I had to do this job.
There is a soft foam seal that fits into the back of the inner door handle
assembly to keep moist cabin air out of the cable and door innards. If this
is missing, you'll have problems at some point down the road. It was missing
on both my UrS cars and I had problems down the road...

HTH

Fred Munro
'97 S6




-----Original Message-----
From: s-car-list-bounces at audifans.com
[mailto:s-car-list-bounces at audifans.com]On Behalf Of Sean Upchurch
Sent: December 15, 2008 12:00 PM
To: s-car-list at audifans.com
Subject: [s-cars] 95 S6 door not opening from inside


This morning my driver's door was frozen shut and would not open from
outside.  Back door did open so I crawled in and opened the driver's door
from inside but then said door would not latch closed.  Started car and let
everything warm up (it was 17 deg F) and then the door would close after
about fifteen minutes but now the inside door handle will not open the door
(it works from the outside though).  So the question is:  what is the best
solution to this problem?  Do I have to remove the door panel? I did the
passenger front before but I have forgotten how (and I can't seem to find a
good write up for it)...

Thanks,
Sean U
Bothell, WA
95.5 S6 Avant
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