I had to find a way of repairing the driver's door handle at least until I can find one on e-Bay or somewhere.

The handles on 800s fail in two main ways. Where the moving part, the handle itself snaps, which is the repair I've done here. Or where the supporting lug in the surround fails (a good guide to fix this is here: http://homepage.ntlworld.com/anthony.forman/repair.htm ). Choose the method you require.

You can see that the lug on the end of the operating arm which operates the door latch rod had broken off. (Ignore the drawing and dimensions on the work-pad in the photo they were for something else).

My first idea was to to use Araldite epoxy to glue it all together, then when set drill a 2mm hole through the joint push a steel (panel) pin coated in Araldite right through, this would strengthen the joint.

Might have worked ok except the handle broke again a couple of days later, the joint I made was ok, it was the plastic that had broken further along, must have been full of stress cracks.

Plan B

I noticed that there were a few mm of clearance where the handle fitted into the housing. I drew around the unbroken end of the handle tracing the shape on to a piece of 1mm thick brass sheet (I picked up at a steam fair for 12"x 12" 50p a few years ago in case it was "useful") Using a pair of snips the shape was cut out as accurately as possible. Sheet steel from a tin or something should do just as well.

A little work with the Dremel finished it off.

And here's the handle with the plate Araldited on. The broken part is held to the plate not just by the glue, it is also staked by 2 pins coated with epoxy  and pushed through two 2mm hole drilled through the plastic. While the Araldite cured the whole lot was clamped together using a bulldog type spring  paper clip with some silicone grease on the jaws to stop it sticking to the handle.

Once the epoxy was fully cured the pins were cut down, and the excess glue ground away with the ever useful Dremel.

Ready for refitting.

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