More on Window Motors

First off, many many thanks to Verrel and Birdman for excellent guides on how to restore the electric windows on a 308 (and presumably a 328). Their information - even the little online "depate" thay have on the methodology is both educational and entertaining.

I am just about finished the same procedure on BOTH of my doors and have some things to add, some, specifically for the passenger or LEFT SIDE door.

Here are some notes in order of my discovery. Most of these notes deal with what to do AFTER you clean out the motor and getting it running with or without the Rodney Dickman Accelerator (which I strongly advise): http://rodneydickman.com/catalog/product_info.php?products_id=91

Thanks to you, too, Rodney for additional details and the policy of selling the accelerator in pairs so that I was motivated to go after the second window at the same time as the first.

1. My driver side door had an annoying rattle whenever I closed it. Not like the high-priced Ferrari "Ther-clunk" finality of the passenger side. This issue was cured when, after connecting the window up to the cables, the window would continually slip out of its rear track when lowered. Looking into this fault, I discovered there is an adjustment screw at the bottom-rear portion of the door - that allows one to loosen or tighten the fit of the rear track and then locking the adjustment (forward or backward) with a large slot-screwdriver screw. After tightening with a maximum snug forward setting, the window worked perfectly and voila, the door no longer had the rattle. Guess it was doing that since I bought the car 10 years ago.

2. There is a clear, soft plastic pair of "drinking straws" clued together at about a 45-degree angle. Each length has a longitudinal cut to allow it to be slipped onto and off the window cables at the point - mid door - where the two cables cross each other. I had removed this when beginning the window job and when I got back to putting it back, it would not fit! None of the angles of application (there are four) worked. I looked at the left door, and that had the two straws welded together the opposite direction. THIS MEANS THAT AT LEAST ON THE PASSENGER DOOR, THE CABLE RUNNING FROM THE TENSIONER ROLLER GOES ON THE OUTSIDE OF THE PAIR. Verrel and Birdman only address the driver-side door and specifically instruct that the cable from the tensioner go on the INSIDE of the pair.

Having followed their directions, I learned that my cables had been reversed all along because there would have been no way the straws I removed would have fit.

AND FORGET TRYING TO FIGURE OUT IN YOUR HEAD THE -- REVERSAL -- IMAGE OF BIRDMAN'S LH DOOR DIAGRAM TO USE AS A RH GUIDE. I simply captured Birdman's great color diagram, put it into Photoshop, reversed it horisontally, and printed it out. Here's a copy of mine.



So what did I do on reassembly?

I cut the straws apart and epoxied them the correct way according to Verrel and Birdman. I did not do this on the passenger door, because when I ran the wires according to the Birdman/Verrel description, the wire from the motor to the tensioner to the motor gets scraped by the "L" shaped bracket with the two rubber buttons that is part of the cable-to-front-corner of the window clamp. By the way, this L=shaped bracket DOES NOT APPEAR as Part 68 on the Ferrari parts drawings!

DOES ANYONE KNOW WHICH WAY THE BUTTONS FACE? (Up or down?) The seem redundant as downward bumpers because of the already installed rubber disk (there are two - one at each end of the window) that keeps the window from bottoming out on the metal frame at the bottom of the door.

3. There appears to be a great grounding screw on the forward lower bulkhead of the driver's side door. There are already some wires nicely posted there. Is this an after-market fix? I grounded the Dicman there. Not so on the passenger side, so I drilled, Dremmeled the paint and mounted a new grounding nut at the 11 o'clock position a few inches from the speaker hole.

4. There is a considerable amount of white, double-faced tape around the perimeter of both doors. This was to secure a layer of clear, flexible plastic film on the inside metal of the door. Removing it is a bear. Use Goof-off and a razor blade. Replace with 3M double-faced foam tape 1/2" diameter. Regular clear plastic dropcloth plastic will work fine. HOWEVER, on the passenger side, I also found some thick, grey, shower curtain plastic on the outside of the window, inside the outer metal layer of the door. Did this serve any purpose? I can't think of anything on the passenger side that would need a higher degree of protection on the driver's side (which is burdened with the mirror adjustment connections). WAS THIS GREY PLASTIC ADDED ON BY SOME OWNER AFTER MANUFACTURING or was it something that was standard on both sides and in my case, the driver's side was removed because that side always gets more use and attention from mechanics who may not have been as meticulous as to replace it???

5. No matter how you get the wires out and back in, 90% of your time on this job will be spent rethreading them and adjusting the window contact points. Here are two tips that Birdman and Verrel do not include that I found a huge time-saver.

I noticed that when you get the motor remounted and start to thread the wire, that there does not seem enough wire to go around - even with the tensioner wheel all the way down. After awhile, I realized that the length of the wire CHANGES as it goes from all the to and from each limit. And then, when you go PAST the limit (assuming you have not threaded it at all) the wires start to really get tight.

This is because once you go past the limit, the wires start wrapping backwards!

So here's what you do.

Thread the wires as best you can, leaving the rear, bottom roller for last (and skip the tensioner). Then use a smooth cylindrical tood (I used a ratchet wrench with a socket attached) to gently take up the cable slack outside the door at the lower, rear area. Then, gently run the switch to the full up position until it starts to stop, gently back off a few inches and you will see, by the position of your ratchet, that you've found the loosest point of the cable. In the full up position, both doors' cables will be their loosest.

With a little effort and perhaps the flad blade of a screwdriver, you can slip the cable under the lower-rear roller and then pull it over the tensioner. Push the tensioner as high up as it will go, hold it in place with a vice grip on the metal (not the plastic!) just below the roller, and then tighten up the tensioner nut.

If you follow Birdman's suggestion and use a vice-grip with a washer to hold the slot screw on the insde of the tensioner bolt, you will need another vice grip, so buy yourself a 90-degree bent flat blade screwdriver ($5 for a pair at Home Depot).

Now roll the window down and you'll see the cable gets really tight as it goes down, but not enough to negatively effect the speed or motion. You'll run this up and down many times, making final window adjustments to get the window to bottom out nicely and also to fill the gap at the top between the window and the roof rubber, but all these times build trust that when you finish the interior restoration, you won't soon have to go back into the door!

THAT'S ABOUT IT TIFOSI! I HOPE THIS HAS BEEN HELPFUL AND SOMEWHAT WORTHY OF MY PREDECESSORS, VERREL, BIRDMAN AND RODNEY! (I won't go there.)

Quasimotor

 

Yep. I know. But there's this really hot date possibility running to your car, all liquid enthusiasm flowing. But your window is up and in that extra second, a matching 308 pulls up with the Dickman installed and steals away your night in paradise. That's ******, man.

 

Hmm. Interesting. I found out by accident, that the AC fan runs with all the fuses out. Well, let's be precise, it ran with each fuse taken out one at a time. I will probably resolve this when I pull my radiator out with the compressor attached to fix what might be a leak and at the same time look into restoring the AC which never worked after the first week of ownership. But that's another story!

PS. My Euro 308's windows only work with the ignition on.

 

What's the timing on the gell cell method?