Bought a used 2017 Dodge Journey from a small dealership, and discovered the next day that the back doors were frozen shut, and wouldn’t re-latch after pulling one door open, despite trying various fixes to get it to latch. Angrily called the dealership, they suggested I take it to the service centre they had an account with, and discovered that by the time I drove down there, the car had defrosted enough to latch shut. Was asked if I had washed the car recently, which of course it had, when the dealership detailed it for us before we picked it up. Problem solved, right? Haha, no.
Fast forward three months and a cold spell of -25C, and the doors freeze shut every time the temperature drops below zero. I have a toddler who I have to load in through the trunk, which is really annoying, although he thinks it’s funny crawling in from the back. Anyway, I’ve brought it to two different service centres since then to try and get it fixed, but since it stays inside in the warm service bays while there, whatever “fix†they’ve done doesn’t actually fix the problem, although it is reported that they found no problem.
The first place just put lock de-icer in the doors, that didn’t help. Second place cleaned out the grease and replaced it with new grease with a lower freezing point, that didn’t help either. Second place also told me that the previous owners probably did something to the doors, thereby voiding the warranty and it will cost me money out of pocket to fix. Which is not what I want, since we bought the vehicle expecting to have some warranty left on it.
So my question is, wtf could the previous owners have done to the doors to make them consistently freeze shut, and is there something I can do to prevent it from happening that won’t cost me $500+ to fix? We park outside and live in Canada, so I’m expecting this to be a problem for about half the year, which I’m not so pleased about.
A D V E R T I S E M E N T S
Bought a used 2017 Dodge Journey from a small dealership, and discovered the next day that the back doors were frozen shut, and wouldn’t re-latch after pulling one door open, despite trying various fixes to get it to latch. Angrily called the dealership, they suggested I take it to the service centre they had an account with, and discovered that by the time I drove down there, the car had defrosted enough to latch shut. Was asked if I had washed the car recently, which of course it had, when the dealership detailed it for us before we picked it up. Problem solved, right? Haha, no.
Fast forward three months and a cold spell of -25C, and the doors freeze shut every time the temperature drops below zero. I have a toddler who I have to load in through the trunk, which is really annoying, although he thinks it’s funny crawling in from the back. Anyway, I’ve brought it to two different service centres since then to try and get it fixed, but since it stays inside in the warm service bays while there, whatever “fix†they’ve done doesn’t actually fix the problem, although it is reported that they found no problem.
The first place just put lock de-icer in the doors, that didn’t help. Second place cleaned out the grease and replaced it with new grease with a lower freezing point, that didn’t help either. Second place also told me that the previous owners probably did something to the doors, thereby voiding the warranty and it will cost me money out of pocket to fix. Which is not what I want, since we bought the vehicle expecting to have some warranty left on it.
So my question is, wtf could the previous owners have done to the doors to make them consistently freeze shut, and is there something I can do to prevent it from happening that won’t cost me $500+ to fix? We park outside and live in Canada, so I’m expecting this to be a problem for about half the year, which I’m not so pleased about.
- ssands, Calgary, AB, Canada