Broken Door Handles -- '97 XLT

Steve I had a '93 that both door pulls borke on. Not sure if that's what you are having trouble with or not, but here is a link to the place that had the replacements for the older Explorers.

Now if someone would come up with a kit to replace the broken return spring in the OUTSIDE handles.............

Right now, my '97 left frt. handle has a broken return spring and (apparently) the only way to fix it is to replace the whole handle.

Yeah, I had the same thought.. a .29 cent spring that you could pop in somehow would be great!

The handles aren't too hard to replace, but they are riveted in place, so you'll have to drill the old one out, and rivet the new one in.

It's just the little tang that holds the spring in place that breaks. other than the annoyance there is really no reason to change the handle out. Especially on an older truck, I'd just leave it alone. The rest of the handle stays intact, so there's really no danger of it quitting altogether and locking you out or something.

I'm more concerned with the possibility of the "floppy" handle opening the door on a sudden jar. Of course, the auto door locks should be activated, but then........

Never happen. there is still quite a bit of force required to pull the handle enoug to open the door.

the handle doesn't weigh nearly enough to activate the latch just from "flopping " around. And, as you said, if the door is locked anyway...