Restricted Sunroof Cable Tube?

Thanks to all the references in this forum, I was able to disassemble the mechanism. The "leverage" component was trash, but the major problem appears to be a restriction in the cable tube inside the body. It's extremely difficult to pass the old cable through. Is there any access to that tube section to see if it's bent?

 

Thanks for the response - so the tube is accessible from inside after removing the headliner. The old cable was bound in the tube, hence the sunroof cable failure. I have removed the cable with no obvious signs of kinking, and I need to apply significant force to push it through. If the new cable does not slide through easier, I'll need to investigate further.

By trash, I meant damaged, unrepairable. All the nylon/delrin portions are cracked, and the drums at each end that push the rear of the sunroof up on closing are completely gone, see the attached pic.
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Mike32,
So the cable is supposed to be difficult to push through the short length of tube between the boot and the roof cavity? If that is so, it must be due to a sharp directional change. When I get back home next week I'll try to clean and lube to see if that provides any improvement.

 

There is nothing damaged in the boot area. The motor and the curved tube in the boot has been removed. The only area I'm addressing is the short tube inside the rear window upright. If there is no possibility that this section of tube is damaged, then either the cable or the lubricant is the culprit.

 

The substitute Porsche 944 cable came in today. It has a new part# 944-564-043-03. I was a little concerned because it is a full 7 inches shorter than the original cable.

I pushed it through the tube and the friction is probably about 50% less. Mostly it feels more flexible than the old cable, but it looks identical. Fortunately, when pushing the cable all the way forward, I still have about 4" left past the motor gear so it will still be engaged with the roof closed. I'm thinking I will have to shorten the copper "loop" tube, to stop the rearward movement of the sunroof with the cap on the tube?

 

The new Porsche cable was $63 + shipping. Of course you do have to cut the ferrule off the end, cut back the coil winding about 2" and transfer the end bracket with the nylon spool, so it's far from plug and play.

I thought that the cap on the curved tubing in the boot served as a stop, so that in order to remove the sunroof, you removed the stop to allow the roof panel to overtravel and release. I reasoned that if that stop was set for a longer cable, then it would over travel even with the stop in place.

 

It's ALIVE. Finally got back to work on the sunroof. I also found that the nylon bracket that secures the cable tube the mounting plate and the motor assembly had multiple fractures. I was able to reinforce and glue together with JB-Weld PlasticWeld quick setting epoxy. Fitting the assembly in the boot was an exercise in patience. Mike32 pointed out that the stop really serves no purpose except to presumably keep dirt out of the tube, but I'm thinking about cutting off the excess tube to allow improved maneuvering during removal/install.

I fed the cable to the motor from the roof opening and got assistance manually turning the motor gear until the coils in the cables engaged. It seemed to be working, so I connected power and operated the switch - the slider moved back and forth in the aluminum track, and operated the new "leverage" arms that push the rear of the sunroof up when closed. So the new Porsche 944 cable was long enough, even though it was 7" shorter than the original.

I still need the rear most long nylon slides on the carrier (these don't appear to be available separately), and will likely refinish the roof panel, since it was scratched from removal, but want to make sure everything is smoothed underneath the fixed roof section so the scratches are not repeated.

 

I finally got everything back together and operational. I repainted the panel - came out nice and actually used adhesive kitchen shelf liner to protect the paint during the install - really did a great job.

The nylon pin bushing finally cracked on my first install attempt, and I had to fabricate a replacement from a nylon spacer from the local hardware store.

I wasn't paying attention and had accidently placed the panel to carrier rail pins into the rear hole of the nylon slides, instead of the front, this made it about 3mm short of completely closing, so out it came again. It's interesting that you have only two hole choices to adjust the overall "length" of the panel. You could also make small adjustments by bending the rails.

I had a lot of difficulty getting the pin to engage the carrier properly - lot of slight forward and rearward movement of the cable and jiggling the roof panel. Once you hit the sweet spot, the roof panel will slide another 4-5cm back into the cavity.
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