10¢ Spring
I spent close to a year trying to resolve this issue. The sliding rear door on my miniest of minivans wouldn’t stay closed. If the car was parked on an incline, it would slowly slide shut. Occasionally, this would pose a risk to the kids, threatening to crush them if they didn’t exit the vehicle quickly.
After I first noticed it, I promised myself to bring it up when I visited the garage for the car’s servicing. Oops, forgot. The next time, I brought it up and they forgot to look at it. The third time, they told me to find the part. I ordered the part on eBay, sent it to a reshipper, received it, brought it to the garage. Oops, wrong part.
Then, I started to go to another garage. They looked at it and said to order the part and bring it to them. Another eBay order, another reship, and… another failure. I show up at the garage… it’s the wrong part.
Third time trying to order, attempt #7. I order the part from a strange Eastern European car parts site. They don’t ship to me, so I need to find a reshipper in Europe. Reshipper in Europe needs to verify my credit card. It takes two days. They verify, I get a reship address, I order the part, the part is shipped to me. It arrives! I have it in my hand!
I bring it to the new garage who now knows my saga and that today might be the day. Yes… this is the part. Oh… wait… this is for the passenger side, not the driver side.
NOOOOO!!!!!!!
“Wait!” the mechanic tells me. He looks at the new part and sees it has a spring and the mechanism on my car doesn’t. He removes the spring from the “new” part (it’s actually a used part) and puts in on the old part on my car.
The door slides open. Click. It remains open. Success! A 10¢ spring was all that was needed. 10¢, a year, and a lot of frustration. Now, my kids can enter and exit the car with delight, without fear of being crushed.
