855 station wagon - Lock motor tank cap deactivation?

On my '96 850 wagon I thought I had this same problem. When I unlocked the car with the key fob, the gas take door was still locked and I had to pop a back panel off to manually unlock it.

HOWEVER (and maybe you have the same problem?) the issue was that at some point someone tried to open the panel while the lock was done and this BENT the metal part on the panel that the lock pin goes through.

Because of this, when the panel was close and the doors locked, the pin would enter the hole in this metal part, but rub up against it. Then when I UNLOCKED the doors, the pin had to much friction/resistance since it was rubbing up against this piece and the pin would not fully disengage/retract.

So before you go through all of the effort of deactivating the lock, look at the gas tank panel/door and the metal part that has the hole the pin goes into. If it looks like it has been pulled AWAY from the door/panel, just bend it back in and then try....

This worked for me! Good luck!

"Atif" schrieb im Newsbeitrag news: snipped-for-privacy@newsstand.cit.cornell.edu...

Thanks for your input! I just had a look again during daylight at about -3 degrees centigrade. When I tried to open the tank door, I felt, that there was some clearance, so the lock stud was not rubbing against the door ring. After manually opening the lock from behind the rear light cover, I opened the tank door and operated the central lock several times while watching what happened with the locking mechanism. The stud moved back and forth, though sluggishly but did not seem to be bent. It did not enter the hole on the other side. I then sprayed some lubricant, it still moved several times back and forth without seemingly being bent. But then after several locking/unlocking cycles it ceased to move completely. So what I have done as a temporary solution is that I have opened it manually, knotted a piece of gift wrapping flat band to the opening ring and threaded the other end through the gap between the rear light covering lid and rest of the inner panel. So at least I hope to be able to open it, if necessary, without having to remove the panels. I will later see how to remove the panelling over the lock to detach the cables completely. Next thing to do is to fill the tank as soon as possible. Regards Viktor