Pajero Owners Club of South Africa

Hi all,
I noticed the bottom hinge on my rear door has a lot of movement so by comparing it to the top hinge I noticed that I can push a screwdriver about 2cm into the bottom hole of the bottom hinge, while the top hinge the pin/bolt at the bottom is flush.
So I gather part of the pin/bolt fell out.
Is it possible to remove the centre pin/bolt holding the hinge together without removing the hinge (or worse - without removing the entire back door).

Thanks
Pierre

Hi Freshman,

I had the same problem..
My bottom hinge pin broke in 2 pieces..top part gets rusted shut..
The bottom part of the pin falls out as soon as it breaks off..leaving a hole for the screwdriver to fit in.

I supported the rear door by opening the door all the way then attach a long adjustable strap to the door close to the door handle (going right around the door)..but first wrap the door with a towel or thick cloth where the strap will take load.

Then attach the strap to a roof beam or something high that can take the full load of the door. (remove spare wheel..the wheel bracket will also double as a fixing point for a rope/strap to balance and take load.

Tighten the strap so that the door starts to lift up ..only to take weight.

You dont need to loosen the top hinge ..leave it as is ..to keep the door upright while hanging from the strap.

You will have to loosen the door panel at the bottom only ..so that you can get a ratchet in to loosen the long bracket that is attached to the door on the inside behind the panel.

I removed the rear right light fitting (corner foglights) also to work easier.

Then i removed the complete bracket from the body and door and put it in a vice to drill the stuck pin out...

I bought a 6mm bolt and locknut to fit right through the hinge from the top down..use washers at the top and bottom of the hinge ..and also apply some grease in the new hole going through the hinge.

Maybe there's another way of doing it better and easier..but i did it with what i had available...

See my pics attached...didnt take any during thefix stage..hope these help..

good luck..

Thanks for the reply - I, for some weird reason, missed your reply until now (after I removed the hinge and came to check my post again).

Anyway - I thought of taking the hinge to an engeneering place to have the pin pressed or drilled out thinking that the pin metal would be too hard to drill out with a normal steel drill.
This after I tried to hammer it out without success.

Did you battle to drill it out??

I was thinking of fitting either a high tenstile steel bolt or a stainless bolt through it as a new pin. That should last...I hope. Seems to be a common problem with the bottom one.

Hi Freshman,

Yes i did struggle a bit to drill it out..maybe because my drillbits were a bit worn..

I first tightened the hinge in the vice and drilled a pilot hole of about 3.5mm/4.0mm ..through both pieces of the hinge..

..was a bit difficult to drill straight as the stuck pins couldnt be hammered out and they are a bit hard to drill through..

If you know someone with a decent Bench Drill with a built-in vice ...then rather let them drill it out smoothly ...that way you can use a bigger sized bolt (grease it up first) ..the holes going through al 3 parts will be 100% aligned...


Good luck.

Ok - all sorted.
Got it back from the Engeneering place today with a "ag just make it 50 bucks" I was out of there.
As per my instruction they drilled it to 10mm plus a kat spoegie so make sure it never gets stuck again.

I then took a stainless bolt and rounded the hex head with the grinder (they did not have dome heads in stock).
Good thing I took enough of the top else it would not have cleared the lights cluster and then it would have meant re-stripping.

At the end I did not even need the lock-nut at the bottom but put it on just to hide the thread. In hidesight I should have cut it to size as the light cluster will make sure it never moves up.

Bit of Q20 and it's good for another 14 years and 270,000km and more...