I have a basic Gen 2 from 2005. She runs great but rust has destroyed a large portion of the back left door. It is no longer inspectable. My mothers friend has almost the same model and color and is retiring her car. My Bodyshop says to replace the whole door it would cost $800, plus time. So... I’m not a mechanic but I know my way around a lug nut. How technical is a whole door replacement, and how does the wiring/ re-wiring work? I can’t find any good info on the web. As far as I can tell there are only about five bolts between me and a new door. But the wiring worries me.
There's one connector for the entire door. Connector is just at the at the car side of door flex (rubber that allows wires to bend when opening and closing the door). So just get it unplugged and then remove the bolt from check strap and then unbolt the hinges. A second person makes it a lot easier to change the door.
Possible headache: alignment of the door? Maybe more so if the car was in an accident, slightly bent?
If either of cars haven't been in accident where door or area around it got damaged alignment is not hard. Especially if you're fine with it not being perfect.
Welcome to PriusChat!! You've got this, and like @valde3 said a second (or third set) of hands will make this a quick and easy project. Have you already removed the old door panel to disconnect the speakers and switch?
Main thing I found was the closing effort. Our case, seemed like no matter how I tweaked it, the replaced door required more effort to close. Best I could do was to minimize the increase in effort. To be fair, this was after an accident. Another car btw.
Pretty sure there's no need to do anything except back the rubber off the car side of the wire run and then disconnect the plug. Then just unbolt the door from the car. If you like your interior panel better, then you can pop it off to switch it. That would require a couple more plugs to be disconnected.
Easy trick that you can do to adjust the striker plate is to loosen the bolts on it a bit. Then just close the door with force. And open it carefully by making sure the handle is fully open before opening the door. Then just tighten the bolts. This should help for closing effort by adjusting the up-down perfectly. If it's still too tight just adjust the door straight and/or out.
Sounds like a backyard swap taking about an hour to 1.5 hour with the proper hand tools and a decent spot to work. Maybe longer if really cold. PS You really should get someone to help you hold new/used door in place while you start the hinge bolts back into their threaded holes.
