GTV6 locks & latches

[Joe Elliott <jelliott@domain.elided>]

  Back in January when it was *real* cold, I had the classic door latch not
latching problem in my '82 GTV6.  The first couple of times I slammed the
door repeatedly and it was fine.  But one chilly morning at school it just
wouldn't close.  Well, I had to drive the car to my college class @ 11:00
(damn high school doesn't offer German--grr), and the door still wouldn't
close.  So I borrowed a torch from the vo-ag department (read: extensive
industrial arts program that's limited to members of the Future Farmers of
America only) and held the flame on the latch--sure enough the door closed
and off I went, only to discover that now I can't lock the door when it's
open.  I finally took the door apart to see what was going on and I
couldn't figure it out so I cleaned and greased the lock mechanism and now
it seems less likely to lock when it's open.  But upon further examination
it looks as if there's a tab present in the driver's side latch that's not
in the passenger side latch as if it's supposed to work this way and it
wasn't "working" before.  Is this correct?  Can none of you GTV6 owners out
there lock your doors when they're open?  If this is the case then I'm
fairly pissed off.  At least I won't lock my keys in my car anymore...

  I wouldn't mind so much having to lock the door from the outside with the
key, except that it's rather difficult to get the key out.  It only comes
out if I use my thumb to push on the metal bit the key goes into while I
pull on the key.  Does anyone have a solution to this problem??

  And speaking of locks, back when I installed the lock on my rear hatch
(got tired of sticking my finger in that little hole to open the hatch) it
worked for about a week and now the button does nothing and I have to use
the key to open the hatch.  It's a matter of pushing on the key with a bit
of counter-clockwise pressure.  Just pushing the button does nothing, but
it doesn't behave like it's locked, it goes about halfway in and won't go
any further.  And if the key does get turned to the "locked" position it's
a real bitch to get it back to the "unlocked" position.  I haven't taken
this one apart yet but any suggestions would be appreciated.

  One more thing...What's the key that's all metal with the quadrifoglio on
it do anyway?

Thanks,
Joe Elliott

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