January 04, 2011 - Trying to bang my driver's side door back into shape. Hoping to get close enough to not need plastic. Haven't decided if I want/need to pull the doors off the truck yet. Might want to get some lower areas blasted.
Also trying to get replacement door parts together (OEM). Most of the window guides are toast - the lower glass guides just turned to dust when I tried to remove them intact. The upper piece (chrome trim) is toast. Got the main door weather strip rubber and a few lower glass guides - still waiting to see if the proper upper chrome/glass guide comes in. Guess I'll need to replace the smashed lock at some point too.
To do it right, I'll no doubt need the same stuff for the other door, even though it's in a lot better shape. That should probably get done before when/if I decide to paint the whole truck at some point.
Finally found a set of door lower window guide channels ebay (needed one for the driver-side door). Nobody seemed to have them, Toyota, SOR, etc. These are from a 76 and seem like they will work for my 78. Toyota lists 2 part numbers (67407r/67408l) for these (discontinued) parts, but passenger/driver seem identical in this set. The new replacement liner “felt” (Toyota) seems more rubber-like than the old stuff. Lower bolt is 90119-06056. The rubber/felt run has an old number 68143 and the new stuff I received from Toyota was 67434-90300 - seems to fit the channel really well.
Also picked up a used driver’s-side door handle but it has a small stress crack in the same place as my original (red circle in picture). This must be a pressure area that cracks on a lot of old handles.
October 04, 2012
The process continues - sort of. One thing I've learned is if you start with spotty uneven coverage it's hard to work your way back. But the paint is doing a better job with less reducer/thinner and the little gun though not perfect (on larger areas) seems to be OK as long as I don't mess up. No runs - and I put down some paint.
Looking at the door tonight I started thinking the paint was too brown - looks closer - not so dark, out in the sunlight. But I guess I'm going with it. Need some additional real life opinions. I may at some point try rubbing out the door and polishing a little - not so much to eliminate orange peel but to see how the color/shine react. See if it tones down a bit.
Getting some internal door parts together, ordered new nylon door hinge bushings from Kurt. That's the used window run support (with new runner) I picked up on ebay to replace what PO ripped out (patched the hole in the door jam) and tossed. I might temporarily put the doors back on for CA winter.
