I purchased a set of core doors for my JK a few months back and I have the Mopar uppers I got off of FBM for cheap. Just wondering if anyone has ventured into the world of attempting to mod or successfully modifying the lock/latching mech to be able to be locked/unlocked with the fob. I don't mind locking each door individually with the supplied key, but might be nice to be able to hit the button and both doors lock.

 

If you’re crafty it wouldn’t be too hard to buy a small 12v linear actuator and mount it to the door and wire the actuator with a factory plug to the Jeeps wiring harness.

 

It's weird, the door actually locks via a small wafer lock that physically prevents the exterior door handle from being moved. Nothing physically locks the mechanism on the inside of the door. Wondering if I could find an electronic wafer lock.

 

To be honest, if someone wants in your Jeep and you have fabric upper half’s, locking the lowers with the world’s strongest lock does no good. I know you’re asking about a lock or modification to your lock but at some point there’s the realization that only a couple inches above a lock is a piece of cloth that no lock can secure.

 

I'm not concerned at all about someone getting in the Jeep, I dont keep anything in there anymore since I primarily run with the soft top on. With the core doors, when they are locked, you can't actuate the mechanism at all, which prevents theft of the doors themselves. Walking around to the passenger side each time to unlock that door first, then driver gets to be a little bit of a pain after a while. Nothing major, but still would be nice to click a key fob button while walking away from the Jeep to lock both doors would be nice.

 

To be real honest, I was very surprised to NOT find an abundance of write ups on modifications made to the core doors aside from paint. Jeeps were MADE for modifications.

 

I can’t say anything specific without knowing the locking mechanism inside the door. I couldn’t find any pics online showing the door with the cover for the lock removed. I did see that there’s a tab you cal pull from the inside that opens the door. So, if you lock the door, does pulling the tab unlock the door? If so then you can add a small actuator inside the door to make your own electronic lock/unlock.

 

The red tab inside that you pull to open the door only works when the lock is unlocked, which you have to do with the key. upper off, door locked, you cant reach inside and pull the tab to open the door.
Photo of the inside of the passenger side door with the plastic cover removed.


One of the lock, and one of the inside of the handle where the lock actually locks the handle in the closed position.

 

That’s a bummer, I think without major work and modifications on all 4 doors, there’s not much you can do. If you truly want an electric lock on those doors you may have to look at the locking mechanism on the factory doors and see if there’s a way to re-create it on the core doors. That’s going to be quite a project though and you’re going to have to do a hefty modification on those expensive core doors. I’m sure that it can be done if you’re determined.

 

One thing to keep in mind that these days, most people (99.9%) want bolt on modification. Not many people are wanting to cut, weld, fiberglass, etc, their Jeeps. Those are expensive doors and I’d doubt that there’s people buying those doors with the intent to cut them up and modify them.