A customer in Windsor got in touch because opening and closing the front door had become intermittent and they wanted it investigated before the mechanism failed completely.
Once on site, I confirmed that the fault was indeed intermittent and explained the investigation charge before removing the multipoint lock.
I did not get particularly far into the gearbox before the problem presented itself. The internal design looked rather unusual, but the fault was simple enough: two small retaining components had loosened and allowed the locking tongue to move out of its correct position.
After joking that the patient needed a little surgery, I removed the loose components, cleaned the area, added thread-locking compound, repositioned the tongue and tightened everything carefully back into place.
Once the gearbox was rebuilt and the multipoint strip refitted to the door, I tested the mechanism repeatedly.
The intermittent fault had gone and the front door was opening, closing and locking normally again without replacing the gearbox.
