Locking your T1N with the key, not the FOB

Hey everyone,
After an escape from the salty and snowy Northwoods of Wisconsin I am in Arizona in the Cibola wildlife refuge resting up with tens of thousands of geese, ducks and cranes. Free camping here.

https://www.fws.gov/refuge/cibola/

Having some time on my hands finally I decided to tackle the manual locking problem that has plagued me since I became the owner of this van.

History.
It came with a FOB held together by a nut and bolt, the RKE did not function, there were no other keys. With a leap of faith I installed a new battery and the dead FOB came to life.
JOY! RKE works.

I accumulated ebay manual key blanks and a Chinese FOB shell and with the help of forum member BrennWagon I got a new FOB shell and flip key along with three manual programmed keys.

Gotta admit I was loving it.

So out I went in the cold Wisconsin winter to try my new keys to lock the doors...NO GO despite several applications of gun oil and electric motor oil shot into the key slot.

OK, fast forward to today...no snow, rocks.



Tried to lock the doors again manually with my new keys...they did not work...but wait, I did not push them in far enough. PUSH. Better but still no turn on either of the cab doors, no go on the cargo doors but when got to the sliding door BOOM. The locks all cycled and suddenly I could lock and unlock all the doors manually.

So what the heck?
Does anyone understand?

I should add my Remote Keyless entry works fine as does my Central locking switch. I only had to read my owners manual ten times to understand the proper sequences.

The Owners Manual is pretty mum on how the manual lock system works.

TIA

bill in tomahawk

If the van locks when you lock the driver’s or passenger door, then your key should too if you can get it to turn... musing aloud:

1: are you sure the leafs in your door lock cylinders are all sliding up and down freely?
The leafs have a lot of surface area so years of dust and disuse can be punishing... a flat lock pick tool can work the leafs up AND down to help free them up. The key only pushes them up against the springs, which may not be stiff enough to push them down again.

2: are the door cylinders actually matched to the ignition key?

-dave

i should have added to my mystery that once I unlocked/locked the sliding door with one of my new keys all the doors locked and unlocked like they should.

No more problems with the manual locking method...so far.

And so yes, all the locks are matched and work smoothly with the gun oil, electric motor oil concoction shot in the key(slot at the moment).

For sure the manual locking sequence has some of the same idiosyncratic characteristics as the Central locking switch or the Remote Keyless Entry.

bill

I have had my Sprinter (and its 4 fobs) since it was new.

I cannot recall if i have *ever* successfully "mechanically locked" the front doors.... there's just too much resistance (for my comfort) when i try to turn the key that way.

**Unlocking** is easy ... the key happily turns in the lock and unlocks the door.

So i'm assuming it's "just a tight mechanism" internal to the door, since all 4 keys happily satisfy the locks' tumblers (leaves) for unlocking.

All 2 cargo area locks (rear and slider) *do* easily lock (and unlock) with a twist of the key.

But for locking, i either use the RKE button, or twist one of the cargo doors to fire the lock cycle.

--dick

I'll put it through a few days of RKE locking and then try the manual locking again to see if anything has changed.

After I got the key do do the lock unlock dance I went around the vehicle and cycled all the locks, they all worked.

bil