Delica Canada | Mitsubishi Van Club

Our sliding door clunked over bumps for a year. It turns out some clips fell off and the the sliding door glass started coming away from the door frame.
Window pulling away from frame. To the right of my finger is the glass. The window should be flush with the body but is out an inch.

The repair: Carefully remove the inside trim piece around the sides and top of the window. There are plastic tabs inside the trim piece that click into metal clips on the door. The plastic is old and brittle so expect to break some of the tabs. I find a plastic bike tire lever is great for removing trim pieces.
Inside of trim piece with tabs.

As you remove the trim piece metal c shaped clips will fall into the footwell of the sliding door. You need these to reattach the window. Some may also hide behind the lower piece of trim and you can carefully reach behind it to retrieve them.
This shows the larger clips that accept the tabs, but also the smaller c shaped clips (little black squares in photo) that hold the window to the frame. I bent a few of the clips tighter with pliers before putting them back on. With all the clips back in you can think about reassembly but first you are probably going to have to glue the broken plastic tabs back on.

I hope this helps someone and it might be worth grabbing your window from the outside to check that it is tight.

glad i found this thread. I think i have the same problem. started with a rattle somewhere on the sliding door/window till i noticed the glass move a tad when i closed the sliding door. it's lifting away from the top of i've temporarily duct taped the top piece of the glass on to the frame, for now.

anyone else seeing this problem? so there are clips lost inside the panels that need to be reattached?

cheers

We might want to compile a list of where to get things like those tabs.

I know that you can buy aftermarket body panel pieces that always come flying off when you remove body panels. You can probably buy aftermarket tabs as well I would expect.

On second look, these are different, and affixed to the trim. So I guess epoxy is really your only option at putting the tabs back together, or replacing the whole part.

thanks for the links and replies. great idea!

I'll have to try and pry it out to see for myself to understand better

guessing the constant open/closing and inertia slowly loosens and jars those tabs till the pry off on their own?

I just tried removing that trim on my L400 as a part of repairing the sliding door rollers and the door latch.

I too broke a few tabs. They are made from a very brittle plastic which over the years has only become more brittle.
I suggest trying to spray some silicon lubricant in the general direction of each tab using the little tube that comes with those spray cans. It may help the tab release from it's metal clasp and possibly prevent them breaking.

I lubed all the ones I didn't break so that they would go in easy and come out easy should I need to work on the door again soon.