Door locks ... rehabbing and replacing lock cylinders

[spacecruisers]

Ah excellent you guys, i wasn't quite sure how that was working! I had a little craftsman pick set i picked up on clearance a while back that made pulling that retaining clip out very easy! Anyway, got one of the new lock cores in. 3 more to go. I think the others were just shot (either that or they were keyed differently...)

I bought some new lock cores from rock auto that came in 2 sets of 2, but the two sets are keyed differently. Can i take one set to a locksmith and have them match it to the other set so i don't have different keys for different door locks on my van ?

[bikerjosh]

Yes, pretty easy for them. Drop off the two locks and the key you want to work with them. Should only take 10-20 minutes

[spacecruisers]

Yes, pretty easy for them. Drop off the two locks and the key you want to work with them. Should only take 10-20 minutes

interesting - so they match it to a key? if thats the case, maybe ill bring in all 4 cores and have them match it to my ignition key.

[bikerjosh]

My understanding is they just swap the shims around to match key profile. On my van I didn't have a good ignition key, so much had the lock smith build a key to work in ignition, then gave him he two door locks to match.

[spacecruisers]

Anyone know if you can buy lock cores for the van besides toyota? The OEM cores run around 40-50 a piece or around 400 for the whole set. Ouch! I bought two pairs of lock cores on clearance at RockAuto for about 9 bucks a set, but they were only for the front doors. The sliding door is very similar so one of those MIGHT work. We'll see. The rear hatch and fuel door are definitely quite different though and the ones I'm in need of. Anyone know of options out there? Or have a parts van or extra parts laying around they'd sell to me?

Anyway, been working on these locks over the weekend. The front driver and passenger doors were quite easy - pop the panel off, swap out the lock core. I'm actually waiting to put the new lock core in because I plan on taking all the cores to a locksmith and having them keyed to my ignition key.

In the mean time I took off the sliding door panel (had to destroy it to get it off - might make another post on that) and rear lift gate panels to fix the lock mechanisms themselves since they were totally frozen.

Here's what the lift gate mechanism looked like (the sliding door one wasn't much better):


Cleaned them up with a toothbrush and blue Dawn soap under the sink and they're working a lot better now. Will probably spray some liquid wrench white lithium on it before i re-install. Doing that next. Thought I'd hop on and update with progress. Heres the photos of them cleaned:

[JDM VANMAN]

mr

awesome clean up, I had pulled some a while back thinking (when I was stripping a van 2 years ago) about doing the same thing but never got around to it, I don't even think I'll remember how to reinstall them?? When you reinstall yours and have the time... maybe you can developer a how to reinstall thread?

thank you

JDM

[spacecruisers]

ah bummer i already put them back together. i should have thought to take some pics - it was pretty straightforward though. the moving parts face away from you and you just reconnect the rods. depending on if i have enough time i may take them apart again and snap a few pics. i've had so little time lately to work on the van and my backlog keeps growing so I've been rushing a lot (need a HG job soon, thats the big one) anyway i haven't actually put the lock cores back in yet - need to take them in and get them matched to my ignition key. also, still need to find replacement cores for the sliding door, tailgate, and fuel door (i think the fuel door may be reusable - the others are completely shot however)

[spacecruisers]

Got my lock cores back from the locksmith today. $25 each (5 cores total) to have them all pulled apart, cleaned, rebuilt, and matched to my ignition key. planning on reinstalling them this weekend. Hopefully they'll last for another 30 years

[TVCamper]

Hi everyone! I will need to replace the lock core in my '88 Van because the key is so worn down that it takes a good 5 minutes of fiddling to get it to turn each time I want to start . The key works OK in the doors, but I figure I should go ahead and replace them all at once. I have an '84 van that I am planning to scrap them from, but I can't figure out how to get the rods out of the plastic clip that holds it in (I think they are the same as the reddish-brown/ brick colored pieces in the bottom picture that mistershmi posted above).

Any tricks to handling this? I didn't want to push it too hard in case these break easily. Or do I just pull the whole apparatus and switch them? I guess that could work too..

[spacecruisers]

Hi everyone! I will need to replace the lock core in my '88 Van because the key is so worn down that it takes a good 5 minutes of fiddling to get it to turn each time I want to start . The key works OK in the doors, but I figure I should go ahead and replace them all at once. I have an '84 van that I am planning to scrap them from, but I can't figure out how to get the rods out of the plastic clip that holds it in (I think they are the same as the reddish-brown/ brick colored pieces in the bottom picture that mistershmi posted above).

Any tricks to handling this? I didn't want to push it too hard in case these break easily. Or do I just pull the whole apparatus and switch them? I guess that could work too..

so the clip has a small collar that clips around the rod, you just have to get some needle nose pliers and push it off then rotate the clip, then you should be able to slide the rod out of the hole. thats what i did and i didnt have problems breaking anything. the clips should be easily replaceable if you do break any, since i believe any toyota in that year range did the same thing.

[boogieman]

my locksmith was able to take my super worn out key and cut me a new key with his computer/code set up...the.computer actually cut the key and it was remarkable all the cuts the new key compared to the smoothed out old one...no more jiggle!! i had another van done and he discovered that the wrong key blank was used and a good 2 or 3 cuts on the end were just missing because the key was too short. everything works great now and was only $16...he was able to do this with just the worn out key and the year and model of the van.