So I bought my 1.8 back in the summer and have now noticed that there is a crack in the paint on the lowers of the driver's door. I noticed that about a week ago. Now after it rained this past week an entire chuck of paint came off so I have this 3" by .25" spot of black on an otherwise silver car. So I went to remove the lower molding by taking out that set screw on the inside of the door, but it just spins and won't back out!?!? Does anyone have an idea how to get it out? I want to fully remove it so I can sand it down and repaint it correctly without just masking it off on the car.

 

Two possibilities - one, the set screw is already unthreaded from the door itself and is just stuck spinning in the lower, for which you can just pull the lower off. Or, it really is stripped out and you have to drill it out and replace it.

 

Ok cool thanks for that. To pull it off You just pull it towards the back of the car correct?

 

Honestly I'm not sure - I'll be learning this spring though. Flying debris broke my driver's door lower last week and I was pissed enough that I just tore it off. In that case, it was more of a "yank outward and twist" than a "slide back" lol.

 

Ok so I went to try and pull this off again today with no success. The set screw is stripped and so I'm wondering should I just drill it out? I tried grabbing onto it with some pliers but they just spun the screw without pulling it out at all. Has anyone else run into this screw being stripped threads before?

 

My side moldings have rusted and are falling off so I took one off the other day since it was about to fall off. I had the same problem you are talking about with my screw. There is a nut in the molding that can come loose and it just spins in the plastic. Before I took drastic measures I just pulled straight out on the forward corner and the molding came off and the nut was left behind. Then I was able to slide the molding back and off the clips. Once you can get a wrench on the nut you can unscrew it and hopefully it will come off with out stripping or breaking the head off the screw.

 

wats with the rusting, I thought the Audis were anodized? atleat in australia I think

 

The car isn't rusting. Inside the rubber molding is a metal strip that helps give it strength and something strong to go over the clips. When that rusts there is nothing to hold the molding on the car and it just starts to fall off.

 

I'm just starting to have this rusted retainer stripproblem with my front door lowermoldings too. Mine are coming off frome the back of the door. When anyone findsthe right way totake these off and come upwith a way to fix or re-install them,postthe diy up here. Does the dealer sell thenew metal piece that goes inside the molding, or do you haveto order the whole new piece of molding for like $300, I'm guessing?

 

I'm not having any rusting problems I'm just trying to repaint my lowers as the previous owner did a quick job before the sale so that it looked nice but now its starting to flake off.

But to those who need the new moldings ECS has them.
http://ecstuning.com/stage/edpd/page...mp;engine=1.8T