lubricating side sliding door runners,bearing

Hi, does anyone lubricate their sliding side door to make it close easier .     Our vehicle is a 2004 boxer.

 Guess doing this could attract extra dust and grit particularly on lower slider , perhaps "dry" lubricant is the thing.

Appreciate some advice ,  cheers

i grease and oil my sliding door runners and bearings regularly.(better dust and dirt than rust eh).G.

...the army used to have a saying - if it moves, salute it.
I have a saying - if it moves, WD40 it.......

Thank you both , i will get busy with the oil can  .

Chris

Silicone spray from aldi

I use spray grease so I can get the grease into the roller bearings. WD is to thin so wont last long plus it ends up everywhere bar in the place it should be,

For lubrication on the sliding door bearings, dip a wide ish flat bladed screwdriver in clean engine oil, then tap the blade against the roller bearings/shafts a couple of times, do this and slide the door back and forwards a few times, also I use a small mixture of grease/oil to lubricate the runners.
I think WD 40 in this sort of application is absolutely useless, but better than nothing.

I use white spray grease, not easy on the VW T5/6.
The cover can be removed (not done by me as yet) BUT you need to have a supply the plastic clips that hold it to the bodywork, also I believe that the rear light cluster has to be loosened. Tackle with circumspection!!
frederic

frederic wrote:
The cover can be removed (not done by me as yet) BUT you need to have a supply the plastic clips that hold it to the bodywork, also I believe that the rear light cluster has to be loosened.

Apparently it's a job worth doing on the earlier T5s, because the seal between the plastic clips and the bodywork was not very good in the original version - leading to rainwater building up in the rear nearside sill section. I have a small envelope on the desk here with the requisite seven plastic clips in it, waiting for decent weather so I can whip ours off and replace them.

Other than lubricating the rollers on the sliding door,is there anything you can do to shut it without slamming it ?

rich g wrote:Other than lubricating the rollers on the sliding door,is there anything you can do to shut it without slamming it ?

It helps to open a window, but if you can't do that you're probably up against the laws of physics - the problem is that the door is a big area, and so its last half inch of travel (once the seals touch) involves compressing a large volume of air quite quickly - which requires a slam in most cases.

Some manufacturers have solved the problem by fitting motorised closing units - which use an electric motor to pull it in so that it doesn't have to be slammed. But it seems to be an expensive option, where available...

rich g wrote:Other than lubricating the rollers on the sliding door,is there anything you can do to shut it without slamming it ?

It used to be the case in the early mk1 Boxers that, ex-factory, the adjustment of the doors was all over the place, and AS didn't address this either. Not sure about the later models, but it's best to start looking at the upper and lower door arms: there used to be tell-tale alignment marks corresponding to the nominal fit condition. Mine was way out necessitating a campsite-waking slam, but loosening and adjusting the arms so the alignment marks coincided transformed the situation. That said in 20 years of ownership, I've never been able to get the trailing edge of the sliding door to align properly so that the door seal was in contact with the van body at the top.

On the door rollers themselves, I've never lubricated them, just kept the runners free of grit etc.

Hope this helps.

Bartfarst

Hi there,

I grease the rollers with a paintbrush and then try and remove any excess from the groove.

While your messing around with the sliding door you might like to consider this bit of extra security.

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It costs pennies and just gives that extra bit of security.  (Oh, and I should have punched the start point before drilling the hole. Doh!)

Best regards,

Simple yet clever Dutto. 

As daft as it seems that would have stopped me from being robbed when i got 'done over' by roadside distraction thieves in Spain five years ago. And this is the reason why central locking has now been abandoned in favour of selective locking which for anyone travelling alone is an essential. I'm not sure at what point manufacturers began fitting selective locking but if it isn't on your shiny new £50k PVC, insist on it or walk away.