Problem with bottom door hinges

casperdog2 · Post by **casperdog2** » 08 Oct 2008, 12:51

My daughters car is a 96 1900tc estate and the bottom door hinge on the o/s has weakend so that the door drops when opened, I thought that it must be the pins but its the hinge.The metal around the hinge (car side) seems ok but it must be very weak, is there a plate behind the hinge that could have come loose or is it a welding job to add a plate to stiffen the hinge area.has any of the forum readers had this problem and how was it cured.(Daft Question)

pete_wood_uk · Post by **pete_wood_uk** » 08 Oct 2008, 13:00

I assume you have a Xantia. A popular topic, the Xantia estate door hinge.

It's just a question of guessing what search terms to use. I just did a search on this forum using three keywords: xantia estate hinge; and ticked the "search for all terms" blob. Useful threads popped up...

I seem to remember that someone once posted an illustrated thread showing the fix, but I can't seem to find it - if you do a more thorough search then you may find it. Maybe it wasn't on this website.

Cheers
Pete

handyman · Post by **handyman** » 08 Oct 2008, 14:15

Hello Casperdog3, this problem with the door hinges on the Xantia estates is well catalogued here, but you may need to dig deep in the archive as it has not been a topic for a while.

However, I think you may find it is the upper rather than the lower hinge on the drivers door that is the problem. It is caused by fatigue and the weld section undercutting the surrounding steel to the door post.

There are a number of ways of curing it.

The first is to remove the door, open the welding around the hinge and weld the hinge plate to the support post behind the door post, and then reweld the door post to the hinge plate. I think that this is how it should have been done in the factory but never was!

The alternative is to access the inside of the hinge plate, drill a hole through it and the support post and secure with a fastener, which I believe ends up behind the plastic wheel arch liner. It may be possible to tap a M8 thread into the hinge plate and run a bolt in through the other side.

My experience has been with the former rather than the latter. Either way its not a difficult job but does require an input of effort.

My first experience of this was to ask a local repair firm to quote, after which I thought about scrapping the car!

If you are near East Sussex, PM me as I may be able to help.

Handyman

XantiaDaveEire · Post by **XantiaDaveEire** » 08 Oct 2008, 18:32

the exact same thing happened to my 2000 hatchback it was dropping down from the hinge until it snapped off completely,leaving only the bottom hinge remaining,i took it to my local where he took off the door welded the plate back on ,€50 job so about 35quid?? easy job if you have a welder anyway

addo · Post by **addo** » 08 Oct 2008, 23:04

handyman wrote:I think that this is how it should have been done in the factory but never was!

Exactly - it's a basic issue of weld penetration. The post stiffener is spotwelded in about four places around each hinge mount pad, so welding can fuse all three bits together. It's far thicker than the post skin.

I have also given some thought to the way they're welded on - two strips; nothing across the top or bottom. In a severe crash, this would possibly give more progressive failure as the door pulled away on two "straps" of metal from the post stiffener. If welded all the way around, it might just pop off like pulling a cork, when under the same levels of stress.

Regards, Adam.

(NSR and OSF reattached, so far!)