Stubborn Power Locks

The locks in my 96 XJ are very pig-headed. They are power, and all of the power stuff works, but the locks require a lot of force to unlock them. More force than the solenoids can provide. Where is the point that needs to be greased to free them up?

I'm afraid that you have to pull the door panels and lube up the linkage.

winterbeater said:

I'm afraid that you have to pull the door panels and lube up the linkage.

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That's not bad, I can live with that. Are these hard to pull? I've never pulled a panel off of one of these. I've pulled panels tons of times, just wanna know if there's any kind of secret trick or something.

Really easy actually. Start from the bottom, pull out (is held in by plastic pieces), all the way around and unscrew the plate for handle and the screws from the arm rest. There is a little clip holding the lock lever and door handle, you just need to pop it off the shaft, and then when everything is unbuttoned pull up a bit up top and the top of the panel should come out.

IIRC there is some form of a relay upgrade for the earlier locks to provide more power to the solenoids...

The real problem is that the lock mech gets all gunked up easily... at least on mine and a few others I've worked on. I had to pull mine, scrub them in a bucket of degreaser for a while, then regrease and reinstall for my locks to free up on most of the doors, and the one remaining door (was jammed shut when I bought the jeep) had such a rusty latch mech I had to pull it and replace it completely.

Go buy an aerosol can of White Lithium grease. Be sure to get the straw. Spray down the small hole just above the lock mechanism. Operate lock. Then spray the latch mechanism and put the straw in the key hole and spray there. I've never had to remove the latch mechanism to free them up let alone remove the door panel.
Yes I've had them be so tight that they would almost bend the rod before moving the mechanism. This was on my 94 and 96 with power locks.