Removing and replacing rear driver side door

[McShmoopy]

Hey everyone,

Some of you may have seen my dash cam footage in which someone drives into the right hand side of me and scrapes and dents my doors, after some back and forth with both insurance companies I managed to get a payout of £2500 for the damages instead of my car being professional repaired.

Incase any of you are wondering why, I opted for this option as my insurer Admiral were trying to write my car off despite the damage being very minor so I went down the route of dealing with the other drivers insurance company and they've paid me out after I gave them a quote from the Lexus bodyshop.  As you can see the main damage is a dent and paint work being scraped. This does go onto my driver side door handle and edge but that seems like it can be buffed off. 

With the main damage being to the rear driver side door, I'm considering just buying a used door on eBay or from a breaker and just stick that on instead as there are many available with the same paint work as mine. I may take this to a bodyshop or have it done myself, but does anyone have any advice or tips for this? I would need to transfer my Mark Levinson speakers to the new door as well as some of the electronics and door locking mechanisms. From what I can tell I just need to loosen some bolts on the door hinge and lift the old door off and replace it with the replacement one and then transfer the existing door internals and door card onto the replacement .

 

[Linas.P]

That is great outcome - well done on dealing with insurance scammers and getting it your way (not common). 

Replacing door is really not difficult and most of the doors I have seen for sale comes as whole package with internal panels, speakers locks and so on. Even if it comes without anything then it is pretty much the case of taking your door out and having them side by side to transfer few bits over. It may be tedious work, but definitely not very difficult. Everything is in the repair manual so you can even follow step by step instructions. 

[Mr Vlad]

Eh up Bilal. Well done in getting that 2.5k from the 3rd party insurance company. Do you have a car body repair shop anywhere near you? Maybe getting a new door skin then all existing wiring will be there still. Otherwise getting a door from a scrapper is the only option. Having help though as the door may well be heavier than you'd expect. As for ML speakers and wiring then that depends on spec of car the used door came from.

[markeyszoo]

IS THE COLOUR 8UO ?

[Linas.P]

35 minutes ago, Mr Vlad said:

Eh up Bilal. Well done in getting that 2.5k from the 3rd party insurance company. Do you have a car body repair shop anywhere near you? Maybe getting a new door skin then all existing wiring will be there still. Otherwise getting a door from a scrapper is the only option. Having help though as the door may well be heavier than you'd expect. As for ML speakers and wiring then that depends on spec of car the used door came from.

The door skin would be the same regardless if car has ML or not, it is only the question of transferring internal panel from old car with all the wiring and speakers. Obviously, even easier option would be to get exact matching door (although I guess wiring would be cut and door still would need to be disassembled to reconnect everything.

Good point regarding weight - the it would be easiest to fit plain door skin and align it before putting anything on it. Door with all the bits will be very heavy indeed (if I am not mistaken 30-40kg). 

24 minutes ago, markeyszoo said:

IS THE COLOUR 8UO ?

Funny enough that is colour of my car and it has ML, just not parting it out... yet. 

[McShmoopy]

40 minutes ago, Linas.P said:

That is great outcome - well done on dealing with insurance scammers and getting it your way (not common). 

Replacing door is really not difficult and most of the doors I have seen for sale comes as whole package with internal panels, speakers locks and so on. Even if it comes without anything then it is pretty much the case of taking your door out and having them side by side to transfer few bits over. It may be tedious work, but definitely not very difficult. Everything is in the repair manual so you can even follow step by step instructions. 

Cheers Linas! I was quite lucky that the other insurance company rang me and gave me this offer, I did speak to a body shop near me to get a rough quote and they told me that a lot of insurers are supposedly doing the same thing to me as there’s a big backlog of parts and repair work to be done thanks to Brexit so for some it’s easier to just fob customers off and write their cars off. Can’t say for sure if that’s the case but it’d make sense as Admiral were insisting my car could be a write off so I didn’t want to take that chance.  

Any chance you know where I can get my hands on the IS250 repair manual? 

[McShmoopy]

40 minutes ago, Mr Vlad said:

Eh up Bilal. Well done in getting that 2.5k from the 3rd party insurance company. Do you have a car body repair shop anywhere near you? Maybe getting a new door skin then all existing wiring will be there still. Otherwise getting a door from a scrapper is the only option. Having help though as the door may well be heavier than you'd expect. As for ML speakers and wiring then that depends on spec of car the used door came from.

Cheers Vlad, my initial plan was to go see a breaker down the road from me who is a Jap car breaker , I’ve got a few IS250 bits in the past and they apparently have a black rear door available. 
 

yes either way I was planning to transfer the internals and my own door card as that seems to be in perfect nick. I have seen a door on eBay for around £69 so may go down that route also! 

[McShmoopy]

27 minutes ago, markeyszoo said:

IS THE COLOUR 8UO ?

I haven’t check the paint code yet but it’s black so I assume it’s the Black Onyx!

[Spock66]

33 minutes ago, McShmoopy said:

yes either way I was planning to transfer the internals and my own door card as that seems to be in perfect nick. I have seen a door on eBay for around £69 so may go down that route also! 

Another option would be to source the part and get an independent body shop to do the work, should still give you change from the payout. Moving all the trim and adjustment of the door to get the alignment right might not be easy, I would guess body shops have a jig for holding doors as they are being attached.

[Linas.P]

1 minute ago, Spock66 said:

Moving all the trim and adjustment of the door to get the alignment right might not be easy, I would guess body shops have a jig for holding doors as they are being attached.

I doubt it, unless by "jig" you mean somebody else's hands. As for moving the trim - as I said it may be tedious just because of vast number of parts, but they all kind of self-explanatory and old door can be used as reference as well.  I reckon 4h job without much rush. 

[McShmoopy]

55 minutes ago, Spock66 said:

Another option would be to source the part and get an independent body shop to do the work, should still give you change from the payout. Moving all the trim and adjustment of the door to get the alignment right might not be easy, I would guess body shops have a jig for holding doors as they are being attached.

My brother in law knows a guy who works in a body shop so can get a rough quote from them, if its not much more cash then I'd be happy to save myself the hassle. 

51 minutes ago, Linas.P said:

I doubt it, unless by "jig" you mean somebody else's hands. As for moving the trim - as I said it may be tedious just because of vast number of parts, but they all kind of self-explanatory and old door can be used as reference as well.  I reckon 4h job without much rush. 

I was thinking DIY is the best bet, that being said I'll need to wait for some good weather on the weekend to tackle this as I don't have a nice big double garage to work in haha 

[Spock66]

1 hour ago, Linas.P said:

I doubt it, unless by "jig" you mean somebody else's hands.

I would expect a reputable body shop to use something like one of these.

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/164962564106?var=0&mkevt=1&mkcid=1&mkrid=710-53481-19255-0&campid=5338749392&toolid=20006&customid=GB_131090_164962564106.140713280561~1432660886624-g_EAIaIQobChMIj4K0oNDS-AIVpgIGAB1-iAHjEAQYAyABEgJB1_D_BwE

[Mr Vlad]

That's a nice jig and I've seen them in a few garages over the years.

£69 for a door? Grab their hands off so longs as it's in very good nick. 

As for door skins it was general practice a good few decades ago and insurance approved. Don't know nowadays as I've been lucky enough not to needed that kind of service. 

As for the wiring loom in the door I suppose it depends where the multiplug is as that could dictate if the job would be a b itch or not. But personally I'd have a m8 to assist coz you just don't know and you'd hate yourself if you dropped it and even damaged the sill. Defo 2 man job.

[Linas.P]

5 hours ago, Mr Vlad said:

That's a nice jig and I've seen them in a few garages over the years.

£69 for a door? Grab their hands off so longs as it's in very good nick. 

As for door skins it was general practice a good few decades ago and insurance approved. Don't know nowadays as I've been lucky enough not to needed that kind of service. 

As for the wiring loom in the door I suppose it depends where the multiplug is as that could dictate if the job would be a b itch or not. But personally I'd have a m8 to assist coz you just don't know and you'd hate yourself if you dropped it and even damaged the sill. Defo 2 man job.

I think there is no multiplug at all, so harness needs to be removed before old door could be removed. As well technically it is not door skin, but rather entire door... and indeed prices are not very high (I assume because a lot of IS220ds met premature end and thus are filling-up breaker yards across the country) - I have seen plenty in a range of £60-150, it is only little bit hard to find right colour. 

[markeyszoo]

On 6/29/2022 at 11:26 AM, McShmoopy said:

I haven’t check the paint code yet but it’s black so I assume it’s the Black Onyx!

looks blue in pic?

 

[McShmoopy]

1 hour ago, markeyszoo said:

looks blue in pic?

 

Just how the lighting is I assure you haha, I did manage to purchase a door on eBay all in for around £88. This one had a few minor scuffs compared to some other examples but this came with the door handle and the window and I'd rather not transfer all that across. 

Door has already arrived today, will make arrangements to fit hopefully in the next week or so!