Driver Door Sticking
 

I'm sure I'm bringing up a subject that's been discussed before but I could use some help. The driver's door on my '56 Country Sedan has begun to stick closed and I now need to give it a good shoulder bump from inside to get it to open. Doesn't happen every time but it is getting progressively worse. I don't really understand how the star wheel locking mechanism works and I hate to start fiddling with it until I do. I don't believe it is the binding on the frame. Before asking for your help, I should have pulled out my manual and see what they say. But...well, I've already written this so I'll fire it off and hope I don't come off too helpless.

Many thanks!

Re: Driver Door Sticking
 

You're too helpless. Just kidding. Check your door hinges to make sure one isn't getting loose. Or a pin is getting worn.

Re: Driver Door Sticking
 

Open the door and try to move the door up and down. If you have a lot of play the hinge pins need replacement (or a loose hinge)

Re: Driver Door Sticking
 

its a 56 ford your lucky any door fits right.

Re: Driver Door Sticking
 

Ouch

Re: Driver Door Sticking
 

With cars this old, Darrell may have a point but it is likely more widely evident than just 1956 or even Ford for that matter. Stuff wears out for certain. The rotating star wheel latch was susceptible to wear but they can be repaired and sometimes NOS ones show up on the flea-pay. Hinges are still the most common problem area for old sticky car doors.

Re: Driver Door Sticking
 

Aside from checking the hinges first, I would look at the number of shims behind the striker plate. Ultimately, you want the "star-wheel" on the door lock assembly to fit squarely with the teeth on the door striker plate. Too few shims may cause the star-wheel to hit the safety-latch plate. Too many shims will not only push the striker plate closer to the door, but may cause a misalignment between the star-wheel and teeth on the striker, which will cause the teeth to wear un-evenly.
If there are no problems on the latch end, a proper door-hinge adjustment may go well toward getting you squared away, but then you will need to re-adjust the striker plate to match the new door position.
I hate to say it, but these '55/56 doors are so heavy that you cant really tell easily if a hinge pin is worn down unless you remove the door altogether and then try to jiggle the hinge on its mounting bracket. If the hinge moves up and down at all, you should get new hinge pins and drive them in.

Re: Driver Door Sticking
 

Had the same happen on my avatar. Turned out to the striker plate had moved a hair so I had to loosen it and re-adjust it. This probably is the first thing I would check out and should be the easiest.

Re: Driver Door Sticking
 

what i meant was they never fitted right from the start.i have a 55 ive been told 55 and 6 were worse than the rest.quality control was a thing of the future.

Re: Driver Door Sticking
 

I have two '55 Fords and have had one '56 Ford hardtop in the past. None of the doors were right on them and I seriously doubt they were ever molested from the factory adjustment.
When you consider that the factory had a huge jig hanging from the factory rafters, probably weighing half a ton itself for the fitment and adjustment of the doors, you have to admit that this door design is pretty woeful. That jig setup was factory protocol, required ample training to operate and probably served as the final quality control of door fitment and proper adjustment.
If you look at the Ford shop manual, they actually show a photo in the "Bodies" section depicting someone heating the door framework with a torch and using a clamped-on bending tool to bend the door structure in case the door contour didn't match the doorjamb or align properly with the top of the car. That's not what I would call precision cutting/stamping of door shell components.
Not to mention the fact that the '55/56 body design was the worst overall through the '50's for major rust-through's (headlights, inner & outer rockers, rear quarters, lower front fenders, bottom of hood and trunk lid). Terrible body design and utterly lousy rust prevention technique, but we love 'em anyway, 'cause they're good looking cars and they have Y-BLOCKs!
Hey, they didn't want to produce cars that would last a lifetime. They wanted you to come back to the dealer in 10 years or less and buy a new Ford car.

BTW, a message to the original poster, I spent nearly all of 2017 performing major rust repair on my avatar shown here and immediately afterward, performed major door adjustments to finally get my driver and passenger side front doors to fit and close right. I posted on this site a detailed step-by-step list of procedures I used to complete these tasks and included photos. The door adjustment posting might help you.
Type "55 Ford door adjustment" in the search feature and scroll down to you find it. Posted in 2018

Re: Driver Door Sticking
 

Every year I go thru the post 8 adjustment on the jamb plate. I think there’s support to be a rough gasket of some sort behind it which stops the movement. Mine’s missing, so I get lazy and adjust it as is.

I try not to look at the fit of the door in its opening.

Re: Driver Door Sticking
 

Exactly my point too!!

Re: Driver Door Sticking
 

When I got my '55 Victoria it had a black, soft pad under the striker plates. They were gooey enough to allow the striker to move. I found some metallic looking pads with a rough finish on ebay. They seem to be holding now.

Re: Driver Door Sticking
 

Do you mean it is only "sticking" from the inside and not the outside? If the exterior door handle works just fine and the door does not "stick" then most assuredly there is a problem with the interior latch mechanism/arm that actuates the door latch at the star adjuster.

If both the exterior and interior door handles are not working well then it does sound like the latch mechanism. Can you send any pictures?

Re: Driver Door Sticking
 

The factory used a shim or shims cutout from asbestos-fibre cement sheets or slabs. They manufactured a few different thicknesses to be mixed as needed depending upon whether the factory had a particular door adjusted closer to the hinge end, or closer to the latch end. The closer to the hinge end required more or thicker shims or a combination thereof. If a door was closer to the latch end, fewer shims were needed. Apparently, as long as a door was installed such that none of the edges would hit front or rear fenders, roof gutter or rocker panel, and the contour ended up matching mating surfaces, it was considered good enough to send to market. However, since none were perfectly uniform in installation, they needed differing shim thicknesses. Still, it only takes a couple minutes for a guy to figure out the number and thicknesses of shims he needed to get the striker plate at the desired position.
Last I looked, many of the repro parts suppliers sell these shims for '55/56 Ford cars, but the new ones are probably made of a different material.

Re: Driver Door Sticking
 

There are some NOS striker shims on ebay now.