Rear Hatch Latch

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Major System Category: Body (Hatch)
Task: Install latch
Parts: Latch parts
Prerequisite Tasks: Assemble and mount hatch latch
Additional Costs:
Time Requirement: 2 hours
Date Started: September 12, 2012
Date Completed:  September 12, 2012
The actual work on the hatch is fairly straight forward, but it took me 2 days to figure what the procedure was telling me to do. Once I figured out the orientation and understood that one of the parts was reversed from the mechanical drawing, things fell into place.

Striker and striker plate with the washers inserted for temporary assembly. I probably could have tightened this down for real, but I was just being slow and cautious.

Consideration: There is very little room for error when assembling this piece. So measure twice, then measure again. Take your time.

These are the rivet inserts located on the inside of the hatch. Factory Five has done a good job in creating  mounting  plates for rivets and rivet inserts.

The first thing I did was assemble the striker with a pair of washers. This was so I did not tighten down everything into the nylon locking nut. This allowed me to have the striker assembled to the correct length. I taped and clamped this to the hatch. I clamped the latch to the body shell tab.

These are the holes drilled for the latch into the tab that hangs down from the body shell. You can see my scribbles with the Sharpie. Orientation: looking towards the rear from inside the engine bay.

The manual says to measure 15/16" from the body shell to figure out where to mount the striker. In a perfect world, this might work. In my world, this isn't quite far enough. I eyeballed the striker plate (minus the striker) and the latch. When everything lined up, I marked those locations with a Sharpie. I then put the striker on the striker plate. This caused me to back off the striker plate from the body shell so the end of striker slides between the latch and the body shell.

This is the big hunk of metal that acts as brace for the  latch. These holes are for the  same rivet inserts drilled for the latch in the previous photo. This is Factory Five's solution to reinforce the tab for the body shell where the latch is attached. I think this area may require additional reinforcement.

I marked the locations for the rivet inserts. I drilled pilot holes with 1/8" bit, then drilled the final holes with the 25/64" bit. I attached the striker first. My thinking is there is more wiggle room for the latch (i.e. it can be adjusted prior to final install to match up with the striker). Once I was satisfied, I drilled out the holes for the second set of rivet inserts. Insert screws and tighten everything down. It is either going to work or fail. The final test was seeing if it works and it did - wow!

This the is hatch latch and striker closed. I plan to get a shaved door handle kit that includes a  trunk popper. I may have to fabricate some sort of brace for the popper solenoid, but it seems much more reliable than running a really long cable into the cockpit.

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