I dabbled in car audio back in 1990-1994. One of my neighbors had an audio shop, and I hung out to learn what I could. Did a lot of free installs and sub boxes for friends. Back then, I couldn't afford the "high end" stuff. I had Profile amps and subs, RockfordFosgate components, MTX electronic crossover. I'm just starting to get back into it. I want to hurry up and get this truck painted, just so I can do the audio install!
Door latch mods.
My dad had an extra set of generic bear claw latches that I decided to use. I'll start by saying, I will never do this again. Next build (if ever), I will cut some out from a modern car in the junk yard, like a honda civic.
Two reasons I did not use the altman latches. 1 - the price $$$. 2 - I don't like how the striker bolt sticks out that far from the jamb. So, me being me, I had to re-invent the wheel and do it my way.
Bear claws do not have a lever for external door handles. With lots of errors... I finally came up with a lever that trips the release mechanism.
Viewed from the top, the new lever is the bent one, which hits the release mechanism.
From this side, the external handle button hits the pad on the new lever.
I had to modify the leverage ratio and location of this lever to hook up to the stock inside handle pull.
Installed:
Note, there is a cable hanging out the opening. That attaches to the stock rod, to manually pull the door lock mechanism any time the inside handle is pulled. This activates the electric lock solenoid which triggers the other door. So, opening either door from the inside will unlock both doors.
There is an electric solenoid mounted to a bracket inside the door.
Here, you can see the other end of the cable that manually un-locks the door.
I feel that these door latches SHOULD be locked when driving. They are way too sensitive, and will trip if hit hard. Therefore why I chose to use electric locks. The hot rod vendors sell electric lock kits that cost a fortune. The better alternative is to buy a car alarm that can activate electric locks. They can be had for $45-$75, and you have the benefit of an alarm system, and anti-theft options. When the vehicle is shifted into DRIVE, the electric locks activate. To unlock from the outside, simply push a button on the key fob. To unlock from the inside, pull the handle.
Once the truck is done and driving, I want to design a system that will also LOCK the doors via pushing the inside door handles forward. I have designed it on paper, but don't have time right now to engineer it and make it work. Basically it will use a second set of door lock actuators in a push/pull configuration to move the door handle forward to lock.
These are the actuators I used. When one is manually moved, it will trigger all four.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0...?ie=UTF8&psc=1