2012 Yukon Interior Door Panels

[Rocket Man]

I live in GA and my 12 came from AL so it’s been in the heat it’s whole life. You don’t have to get defensive about it, I’m not saying you trash your truck. Most people don’t even realize they’re doing it. I had to train my wife not to yank on all the handles but rather just get the door moving gently and the weight will take over. It is a cheesy design but being gentle with it is the only thing that’ll make it last.

IMO we shouldn’t have to be “trained” on how to shut our doors without breaking them. It’s not abuse that’s breaking these, it’s a shit design. They break just like the dashes break. That’s the 2 design and or material errors in this platform. Both items are expensive fixes. The dash and front extension cost me about $700 in parts alone. The door panels are over $500 EACH for new ones and all they need is new handles but GM decided for some reason they won’t sell just the handles. It’s a crime imo that we can’t buy a new handle for a reasonable price and instead have to pay a fortune for the whole panel. I don’t complain about things and even after the $700 to fix the dash I wasn’t bitching but then the door panels happened and here I am.

 

[91RS]

It’s common sense not to unnecessarily yank the crap out of a door to open and close it, especially a big heavy door. I don’t yank and slam the doors in my house, if I do the door jam will eventually fall apart. It is a crappy design but that’s all the more reason not to yank it and slam it. I used the word train because my wife was still used to the light flimsy doors of her old Aveo.

 

[Rocket Man]

These are breaking without people yanking the crap out of them. I’m telling you, I disassembled 8 door panels I bought. At first look, they’re fine. You can’t tell that half the screw races are cracked and the screws are only held in place by the broken plastic parts that remain. Those screws aren’t holding anything. So out of the 12 or do screws that hold each handle on, maybe 4 are still doing their job. It doesn’t take a genius to figure out that handle is weak as hell and it won’t take much for it to break. I’ll bet if you pull your handle off you’ll see what I’m talking about and your story will change. Try it, take a look. Pull a panel, remove a handle and then come back and share what you find.

 

[bill1013]

I live in GA and my 12 came from AL so it’s been in the heat it’s whole life. You don’t have to get defensive about it, I’m not saying you trash your truck. Most people don’t even realize they’re doing it. I had to train my wife not to yank on all the handles but rather just get the door moving gently and the weight will take over. It is a cheesy design but being gentle with it is the only thing that’ll make it last.

Point taken. no harm...no foul. Aloha!

 

[gooffeyguy]

Maybe we can get Gruven to make metal handle races to replace the plastic ones (like they do with the mirror gears and heater Ts)?

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[Rocket Man]

Maybe we can get Gruven to make metal handle races to replace the plastic ones (like they do with the mirror gears and heater Ts)?

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I don’t see how. A complete reinforced handle is needed. Here’s one that I saved. In this first pic there are 4 screw locations. The 2 in the foreground that are kitty corner next to each other are 2 of the ones that the metal plate attaches to. You can see one is completely wasted and the other won’t hold a screw tight. The 2 in the background are where the door panel attaches to the handle. One is cracked and won’t hold a screw. The handle itself is cracked around this area too, because the metal plate wasn’t doing it’s job because it was no longer attached to the panel, it was just attached to the door itself.

 

[mikeyss]

I've had the door panels off of my 09 quite a few times and I haven't had any issues with the metal plate attachment. Screws are nice and tight too, I re-torqued all of the screws when I was doing my sound deadening project.

When I worked for GM as a tech a few years back, I never came across this issue. However window regulators and door handles....I lost count of how many of those I replaced, haha

 

[mikeyss]

Next time I have mine apart (hopefully not for a long time) I'm gonna check mine. I can see where this design does suck

 

[Rocket Man]

Here’s the other half of the handle. It has 7 screw locations. The area where the metal plate is supposed to attach , left foreground, is completely broken. There’s nothing attaching the handle to the door itself on this side without that plate being attached to the handle, it’s just attached to the door panel itself via the other screw locations of which there are 5 total and 4 of those won’t hold a screw. Notice the broken plastic in the area by the left screw in the back. It’s cracked in the corner. Keep in mind, this door panel and handle was still functioning when I bought it. I disassembled it to paint it, and that’s when I found out how bad it was. There was no use installing it. All it needs is the handle but I can’t buy just the handle. I don’t see how Gruven could make something to fix this. And I don’t care how gentle you are closing a door with this panel on it, it’s just a matter of time before the last 2 screws come out since the steel plate isn’t doing anything.

 

[Rocket Man]

Here’s a metal plate, it’s not the right one for this panel but you get the idea. It attaches with 2 screws at the bottom into the panel and 4 at the top into the handle, then it attaches the panel and handle to the door with 2- 10mm bolts. If it’s not attached to the handle because all the screw races are broken then it’s not doing any good and your panel is weak. And you cant even tell unless you remove the handle because the 2 at the bottom never break but that’s not doing any good.