Well.. i did it. Sort of at least. The wires are not connected, but I wil let the installer who is installing my rear speakers deal with it. Alteast I saved my doors from being drilled. The driver door has the wires in it. The passenger door panel was easy too take off, perhaps because I knew exactly what to do now. I ran into a problem there. I couldn't push the wire through the rubber boot connecting the car's body to the door. Its sticking half way through. I will let the installer deal with that. I am getting tired of dealing with my hands being cut:p Hopefully by 4PM tomorrow.. I wil have sound and my car will look great again. right now the passenger door panel is off and lying in the back seat.

When the weather warms up again soon.. I will take a looksy at the door locks. I have a problem with my power door locks, and will need to know whats wrong with them. I am getting tire of manually opening and locking all my doors... considering the car SHOULD have power door locks.

Snibble
Have you tried the straightened out coat hanger to PULL the wire through the door jamb rubber boot? This tip has saved me from having to remove and reinstall those pesky door jamb rubber sleeves for years. Try this:
1. Put on gloves (Mechanix are excellent).
2. Cut the head off a wire coat hanger and straighten it out.
3. Run the hanger through the rubber boot from the door side.
4. Feed the hanger down into the footwell where you can grab it.
5. You can attatch your speaker wire to the hanger directly or you can tie a string onto the hanger and then onto your speaker wire. Using tape and string is encouraged.
6. Carefully pull the hanger back through the door jamb sleeve and drag the wire into the door cavity.

What type of speaker will you be putting into the door? My 420SEL does not have a speaker in the door yet. Are you running the speaker wire directly to the head unit or to the factory fader switch near the shifter?

__________________
1986 420SEL. 200,000 miles plus.
1991 Cutlass Supreme
1980 VW Vanagon (Old Smokey)

I will try that technique with the wire hanger tomorrow. I will have the speaker wire connected directly to the head unit. Same goes for the other speakers. Also, I am using my stock speakers for now. They sound OK, don't see why so many people are saying they have horrible sound quality... maybe I am not used to hearing good speakers?:p

Snibble,

The problem with you power door locks is probably a bad vacum pump. All four doors, and the trunk are turned on and off via electric switches in each door that move the locks up and down via vacum.

Try opening the door locks via the trunk.

On my W124 car, the vacum pump is located under the passenger seat, on the right side.

__________________
Paul S.

2001 E430, Bourdeaux Red, Oyster interior.
79,200 miles.

1973 280SE 4.5, 170,000 miles. 568 Signal Red, Black MB Tex. "The Red Baron".

Alright.. I endured some more pain and the chilling weather and finally managed to get the wire through into the door. I found the easiest way for me to get the wire in was from inside the car and pulling it out from the door. The tempreture right now is in the 20's and its also windy.. so I am not gonna freeze my butt off over this. Right now the wire is in and I put the panel up. Will need to hook up the power seat switches and screw on the arm pull. Just noticed that the bottom part of the panel is not hooked on to the door.. so will need to put that on. I believe I got the tough part of the job done.

One more thing.. I accident punctured the rubber hose that all the wires go through into the door. Doesn't look bad, but will take a better look when there is more light. Is there a fix for this? Should I be worried? Should I super glue or what? I am not going to replace this part because I dont want to go through all the hell in putting ALL the wires through.

Thanks again..
Sharif

Suginami.. tell me what I need to do. Here is what I can get done with my power door locks..

From the trunk I can open the front passenger door. All other doors are uneffected. The Driver door can lock the front passenger door. Other doors dont do anything, except the trunk which I can lock AND unlock from driver door. I hear the pump in the trunk work also. Any ideas?

If you can open and close the door via the trunk, then I believe it is the electronic switch in the drivers door. I don't know how this is replaced as my problem was the pump.

__________________
Paul S.

2001 E430, Bourdeaux Red, Oyster interior.
79,200 miles.

1973 280SE 4.5, 170,000 miles. 568 Signal Red, Black MB Tex. "The Red Baron".

Success!

Took it to the installer and have all my speakers hooked up. I have a great sounding car now. I also learned how to hook up speakers, cd deck as well as learning to remove the door panels. Takes me now about 10 minutes to do it. I would like to thank zla39fj for all his help... I will be emailing you shortly asking for your mailing address. If I do go to Europe again this summer.. I will be shipping you some czech/german/or polish beer as a token of appreciation for being specific with your instructions

Thanks to all for your help

Snibble
Congratulations!! It is a pleasure to be able to assist you. I am surprised that you were able to pull it off when I look back and reread my posts. In the Navy we are trained to " do not tell them what they can understand ; tell them what they can not possibly misunderstand". I guess that since I was not looking at a uniform I just disregarded my training. It will not happen again.Which head unit are you using? How much did the installer charge you for his talents? If you are satisfied with his work, stick with him. Be certain to tell your friends about his shop. This can set you up for some free advice in the future. Thanks for the beer offer, but I would prefer a photo of the prettiest lady you see instead. Man I miss Europe.

__________________
1986 420SEL. 200,000 miles plus.
1991 Cutlass Supreme
1980 VW Vanagon (Old Smokey)

suginami
I was contacted by a member of this forum and asked to give detailed instructions for removing the door panels on a W124. I could not really help that person out. I have never installed on a W124. Is it possible for you to post the instructions on this forum.

__________________
1986 420SEL. 200,000 miles plus.
1991 Cutlass Supreme
1980 VW Vanagon (Old Smokey)

Snibble,

I'm happy that you got your speakers installed.

I work at Home Depot in the electrical department and I'm very surprised that you used 12 gauge speaker wire. That wire is too too thick. Actually the insulation is too thick. We call it Monster speaker wire. Typically it is used on speakers that are really big!
The thickness of the insulation is what probably caused you the most problem. If you had used 16 gauge you would had had no trouble getting it thru the regular wire harness/boot that all of the other wires go thru to the door.

GREAT JOB!

__________________
Frank
84 500SEL EURO 101K ( JUST LIKE MY 1ST WIFE. GLAD TO GET RID OF HER! )
85 300D 310K (sold)
90 350SDL 184K sold
83 300D 118K (sold)
88 300E 153k (sold)
93 400E 105K (sold)

Heh.. well, I managed to get it through the door I am not familiar with wires so I went with what was said.. a 12 gauge. I asked the man at Home Depot for 12 gauge speaker wire and thats what I was shown.

The installer who was installing my rear speakers was also amazed. But I found out that the wire was a little short, so he extended it.

Thanks for all the great help this forum provides.. keep it up!

I decided to take a little time to post my experience and my way of removing the door for anyone else down the line who will need to know how to remove the door panel.

Tools that I used were a philips screw driver and a butter knife.

1) using the butter knife, gently pry-off the power seat switches.
2) Remove the cover over the power seat switches.
3) using butter knife, pull back the black plastic piece in back of the silver door handle. Should be pretty simple to remove.
4) Once piece is removed.. a single screw will be exposed. Unscrew that.
5) Pull the piece that the screw was holding down.
6) A gold large philips screw holding the top of the arm pull will be visible, unscrew that.
7) If your doors have speakers, remove two screws from the bottom of the speaker housing.
8) Pull down the speaker housing and it should come off.
9) Remove the screw holding the center portion of the arm pull. This screw is hidden, its located by finding the hole with your finger.
10) With the speaker housing out of the way, you should be able to unscrew the third and last screw off the arm pull.
11) Pull off the arm pull
12) The power seat box is screwed on with two long gold screws. Unscrew this and unplug the plugs that are attached to it.
13) Remove the entire power seat box.
14) Unscrew the two screws holding the silver C-shaped metal object on the side of the door.
15) Unscrew the black cap which locks and unlocks the door.
16) Unscrew the vertical panel above the main door panel. Its hold on by one screw.
17) Gently and firmly grab a hold of the panel and pull upwards and then towards you once its pushed up.


Thats all I believe I did in taking the door panel off... to put it back on, use the reverse steps.

Snibble
That was a great step by step post for door panel removal on your car. I am certain that it will be helpful to many others for years to come. The reason I suggested 12gauge wire instead of smaller wire is for increased current handling capacity should you wish to install a high powered amplifier later. Why go through the effort of rewiring the door later if you can do it all at once. Another habit I have is running rca cables and remote turn on wire to the trunk when I install a headunit, of course I also run power wire from the battery area to the trunk also to facilitate amplifier additions later. Right now I have a sub standard system in my 420 but all of that will change in April I when cut loose. Trust that I too will run 12 gauge wire to my doors even though there are no 8" Oz Audio subs there yet.

__________________
1986 420SEL. 200,000 miles plus.
1991 Cutlass Supreme
1980 VW Vanagon (Old Smokey)

Its me again :p

During the instalation of the door speakers, I some how fixed the front passenger power door lock. I must have did something to correct it when fiddling around with the wires in the rubber boot.

I am trying to fix the door locks in the rear doors, but have a little hard time with it. I removed most of what was needed to remove, but can't figure out how to remove the ash tray thats built in the door. I have half the panel off from the rear... just can't the the side with the ash tray off. I have a feeling there is something that needs to be taken off which I haven't.