convertible rear window motor repair

escbsap · Sep 20, 2010

Hello everyone, the REAR window motor gears on my 89 convertible are broken, again. Does anyone know where to get the replacement gear only, the last time I bought them was through ebay, but can no longer find them. I hate to replace the motor, since its only the plastic gear thats broken. Also, any ideas as to why the gears break so freaquently, will the gears for the front window motors work??

Lawbreaker5.0 · Sep 20, 2010

Autzone or any parts store for in the self help section. 7.99. You packed them with grease right?

escbsap · Sep 21, 2010

yeah, I packed them with greased, they just seem to break easily. I'll try a local auto parts store, thanks.

Onefine88 · Sep 21, 2010

Instead of buying the plastic gear pieces again do this.
You'll never need to replace them again.

Remove the old greasy plastic gravel. Clean it out well and replace them with 3 quarter by twenty nuts. pack it with grease and close it up.

They fit perfect around the large center gear. I've done a ton of these and never had a problem with the motor again.

Good Luck

93tsiawd · Sep 21, 2010

back windows

I went to the junkyard and got manuel 1/4 windows, the bolt holes are there. All you need to do is drill 3/4 if i remeber right for the handel shaft. a couple hour job. when you take it out, you will see how it works pretty simple, and no more problems.

Lawbreaker5.0 · Sep 21, 2010

^^^^what???

escbsap · Sep 27, 2010

can i find these quarter by 20 nuts at my local hardware store, the nuts are gonna take the place of the larger plastic gear? how do they work with the gear shaft/rod that works in sync with the large plastic gear? do you have any pics? I will try this method for sure.

escbsap · Sep 27, 2010

89SSC18, should i pack them with grease.

Onefine88 · Sep 27, 2010

The large triangular center gear stays. The 3 nuts replace the small white plastic parts that were ground up and mixed with the grease. Pack it all in grease and close it up.

escbsap · Sep 28, 2010

89SSC18 said:
The large triangular center gear stays. The 3 nuts replace the small white plastic parts that were ground up and mixed with the grease. Pack it all in grease and close it up.

the gear and the 3 bushings are ground up??

Lawbreaker5.0 · Sep 28, 2010

What he's saying is the three rubber bushings gets ground up over time and they mix in with grease. The triangular gear should not be messed up at all and is re usable. Have you opened the motor up and looked at it? If you stop by a autozone and look at the gear set in the help section you'll see on the back the orientation of the bushings triangle piece.

Onefine88 · Sep 28, 2010

Lawbreaker5.0 said:
What he's saying is the three rubber bushings gets ground up over time and they mix in with grease. The triangular gear should not be messed up at all and is re usable. Have you opened the motor up and looked at it? If you stop by a autozone and look at the gear set in the help section you'll see on the back the orientation of the bushings triangle piece.

Well said sir!!

twistedwankel · Sep 28, 2010

escbsap said:
Hello everyone, the REAR window motor gears on my 89 convertible are broken, again. Does anyone know where to get the replacement gear only, the last time I bought them was through ebay, but can no longer find them. I hate to replace the motor, since its only the plastic gear thats broken. Also, any ideas as to why the gears break so freaquently, will the gears for the front window motors work??

I had a guy come to my house and for ONLY $35/rear 1/4 window he pulled the covers, replaced the center gear, three nylon bushings, repacked and realigned my whole window assembly so it fit better. No more wind noise. Sometimes you are better off finding a pro. If you break the regulator you will be totally SOL as most older ones are no longer available other than a boneyard.

Does the 89 use cable regulators? Those are a really bad design. I would be concerned if you do this more than once every 10 years. Do you normally lower ALL the windows prior to raising or lowering the top? That is recommended to avoid failures due to misalignment and stress.

greg8470 · Mar 28, 2011

Window motor gear fix

89SSC18 said:
Well said sir!!

I have to commend the motor bushing replacement idea using 1/4 - 20 nuts! After replacing the original set of synthetic bushings (which were indeed ground up in the grease) with similar bushings, the motor ground up the second set in less than a week. The bushings were taken from a pirated motor about 10 years ago, so they may have been weak.

So over the weekend I used six (6) 1/4 - 20 nuts as replacement bushings and the motors works good as new. My only concern is that the main plastic gear will now be the weak link, but for sure the nuts won't be! Thanks for the ingenius suggestion.

HISSIN50 · Mar 28, 2011

If anyone has kids, they might want to be careful with the metal nut method.

The OEM design is engineered to have that torque relief. Imagine a child's fingers above the rising window. The nuts will not give way like the bushings did.

greg8470 · Apr 7, 2011

Now the motor is dead

Well, the nuts worked great, but the motor has now petered out, which suggests there's something in the window lift mechanism that is binding requiring excessive torque. Guess I'm glad it died in the "up" position.

Anyone have ideas on what to look for? I'm getting tired of digging into the dadgum window motor, although I'm getting pretty good at it now.

Onefine88 · Apr 7, 2011

greg8470 said:
Well, the nuts worked great, but the motor has now petered out, which suggests there's something in the window lift mechanism that is binding requiring excessive torque. Guess I'm glad it died in the "up" position.

Anyone have ideas on what to look for? I'm getting tired of digging into the dadgum window motor, although I'm getting pretty good at it now.

I hear ya buddy. I've been there having owned two of these verts and worked on more helping friends with theirs.

One thing I should have mentioned above about the "nut trick" is it seems like the 1/4x20 nuts fit very tight and perfect. Almost too perfect. There is no slack at all. The original plastic nuts/gears were slightly smaller allowing a little slack in the mechanism. I feel this slack allowed the motor to "kick" so to speak to give the window a jolt to get it moving.

On good working strong motors this is not a problem, but weaker motors have problems with this quick fix.

Couple years ago when I bought my '87 the rear windows didn't work. So, I investigated and sure enough the plastic gears were totally gone so I did the "nut trick mentioned above" fix that worked so well for me on other cars. It worked once again and the windows worked.

But,, on this particular car the motors were weak, slow and would sometimes get stuck up, and sometimes get stuck down. "Sounds like yours"?

I ended up replacing the entire motor assemblies with new ones and all was well. My front window motors were slow but worked so I decided to replace them later.

These little electric motors simply wear out in time. Not just the gears.

Good Luck

convertible rear window motor repair

escbsap

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