Seized Trunk Cylinder Lock

[baymoe]

Last winter I noticed that the lock cylinder was seized. Odd, it was working the day before and thought nothing of it and went to CT to grab some lock deicer. Sprayed it in, nothing. Sprayed some more, nothing . Kicking myself for wasting the $2 for deicing liquid now .

After much search, it turns out a bunch of others are experiencing the same dreaded seized lock and decided to try and fix it myself. First off, this isn't going to be a comprehensive how-to as I'd like it to be due to dirty hands and not wanting to dirty the phone.

Here goes....

1) Remove the plastic clips holding onto the liner for the trunk. Use a thin screwdriver to pop off the middle section slightly to remove the entire clip. There's like 14 of them in all.

2) Liner should just pop off at this point.

It should look like this...



3) There is a little white clip that is attached to the lock release. Rotate the white clip off to release solid metal wire and the wire will just come right off.

Here is a better picture of the white clip...



4) Remove the two 10mm nuts that is holding the lock cylinder to the trunk.

5) Use a small flat head screwdriver and carefully pry the lock position sensor from the cylinder itself. It is not necessary to unclip the harness like I did in the picture.

From this point forward, due to dirty hands I'll try as best I can to disassemble the cylinder by text but it should look like this below.

Depending on the severity of what is seized, you may just spray with WD40 and it fixes itself, great. If not continue below. It requires taking the cylinder apart.

6) With the cylinder in hand, remove the C-clip from the back of the cylinder.



7) Next in order to remove the silver cap at the front of cylinder, use a metal tooth pick or similarly small screwdriver and get underneath the indented 4 sections and lightly pry/lift it. It needs to be lifted high enough to clear the circumference of the cylinder.



8) Once the cap is off, insert your key and the cylinder should slide out the front. ***This must be done to lower the tumbler pin otherwise the pin will obstruct the path of exit.

Important: If the cylinder cannot be removed, with key still inserted, tap the rear of the unit. Most likely (this was the case with mine), the spring in tumbler 1 (closest to the front of the lock) was broken and it remained in the lock position until I was able to tap it back into neutral position (pins all flush with the cylinder).

9) With the center section out, carefully observe the pins while moving the key in and out to see which of the pins are not moving and is still protruding. Remove that pin with pliers.

Note: Although removing the pin will compromise the overall security of the lock slightly, it is something I can live with.

10) Clean and re-grease the assembly.

11) Using a small flat head, lightly tap the indents of the cap to secure it.

12) Install everything back the way you took apart!