Help! Cannot Open My Door on a 1996 Lexus ES300

[ray]

On my 1996 Lexus ES300 I cannot open drivers door from the outside. It started with the little yellow clip that often breaks so I went to the dealer and bought that.
Got home with the clip and the entire rod broke at the end where it bolts to something. I know one end (the end with the clip) attaches thru a hole on a bracket of the outside door handle. The other end is broken off where it looks like it bolts onto something.

The image attached shows the original exterior door handle rod and its broken end. Can anyone tell me what it attaches to? Anyone have a diagram or reference I can go to in order to look this up? The rod actuates in a vertical direction (up and down). I appreciate anyone who has any info to offer to help me locate where the end opposing the clip end goes.

Thank you all in advance,
Ray

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Topic

[John B Kobberstad]

Put the rod back on where it attaches with the yellow retainer clip. If the rod goes vertically down from there just look for its point of attachment. It should be somewhere close to the broken end. It looks like you could probably fix the broken end by welding an appropriate sized washer to the broken end. It probably attaches to the door latch mechanism on the side where the door latches. You could always take the door panel off the other door and look to see how it is attached on the other door. Hope this is helpful to you.

John

[ray]

I like the idea of welding a washer to the existing rod. I just don’t know anyone who has a welder. I will see what it costs to just buy the rod from a wrecking yard or something. I do appreciate the advice though, thank you!!!

[John B Kobberstad]

you could probably drill a hole in the washer and the rod end and rivet them together.

[ray]

Thanks all and johnbkobb for following up…

I went to a local wrecking yard and pulled the striker assembly off an LS. Perfect fit. Just transferred over the rods from the original and had my new one in place without having to drill or solder anything. The trick was getting all the little blue, yellow and grey clips to stay intact. Turned out to be about an hour to get everything all fixed and back into place carefully.

If I would lend any advice to anyone dealing with this issue, I would say make sure that you are careful if you do not have a bag full of retaining clips to back you up while your doing the swap. The retaining clips are at the end of each rod, and are very brittle. If you just ‘John Wayne’ them off you will end up having to wait to buy them from the dealer and pay a lot just for a cheap old plastic clip.

All works great, and now I can move on to looking for a used window regulator…

Have fun, guys!

[John B Kobberstad]

Thanks for the follow up. They help others to find answers for the same problem.

John

[college man]

Thanks for the update.

[Author]

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