Changing Locks on my Porter

Hi,

Toerag tried to hotwire my van. Luckily, the alarm and some passers-by scared them off before they got away with it, but my driver lock is mangled and the ignition barrel battered. They couldn't get it out though, Hijets and Porter ignitions are quite well armoured. Just a heads up, Police told me that these vans are targeted by Romanian/Bulgarian car gangs in the UK, to take out of the country.

Anyway, I bought a new set of locks, doors front and back, and ignition, off a scrap van. Fitting them now. The ignition looks straightforward, but haven't tried it yet. My driver door lock is the first to get in.

Anyone done this? I took off the panel, but there is a thick metal rail from the window sliding mechanism in the way, stopping me getting to the catch, to pop the lock out of the door exterior. It doesn't seem likely I need to take out the entire lock mechanism and window frame, just to slip a new lock in. I did it before on a Nissan Elgrand and it was just a catch release and it popped out. No major disassembly.

Any ideas?
Cheers,

The locks are pretty straight forward, i just had the wrong tool. A very long, thin flat head screw driver works well to get the clips off and get them back on, and be able to reach around the metal frame of the glass window, once you have the door panel off. It just takes a lot more force than first you'd think, and worrying about snapping the clip. Then it just pops out door exterior. The only bit to watch is taking off the winding window handle - the retainer clip unhooks from the top, and you need to get a thin, hooked tool into it, then it just pops out. I wouldn't try it with a screwdriver there - looks like it could be damaged easily if you tried to force it.

ignition barrel tomorrow, I'll post up some pics when I'm finished - could be useful for others.

I'd also consider wrapping a motorbike security chain around the steering column and ignition, if I was leaving it for a while somewhere unsafe. I have a 1.8m, 10mm bike chain and it covers the steering column completely.

This is the first time I had someone try to break into the van, I nearly always leave a steering lock and handbrake lock on, if it's somewhere dodgy, and I'm leaving it a few days. I didn't this time, visiting a friend near the middle of London. Luckily, they couldn't get through the ignition barrel casing, but mangled the ignition barrel trying.

UPDATE

The ignition was really easy. You just get take off the plastic steering column trim so you can get to the ignition mechanism, then put the key into the lock and turn it one click to the "ACC" mode, then use a screwdriver to press down on the small metal pole at the end of the barrel holding it into the ignition casing. Then it just pops out, you put your new barrel in, set to ACC, then the pole locks into place when you take the key out. Simple.