SO moved this from my "Cursed Cruiser" thread.
https://gmlongroof.4umer.com/t7190-cursed-cruiser?highlight=cursed+cruiser . Here is the latest novel and pics.
As mentioned in that thread, I took the car for state inspection (it passed smog, yippee), but when I powered down the driver's side door window to hand over my insurance card, the motor burned up and the window was stuck down.
If you read the thread above, when I bought the car the driver's rear door window needed a new motor....so I'm getting good at replacing these....
That door still had the original motor in it when I took it out. Have no idea why this car is so hard on power windows, other than the fact that I'm sure, with such low miles, that it sat a lot until I bought it.
ANYWAY, I tried replacing the driver's door power window switch first, hoping that would fix the issue. I'd noticed that the window switch would sometimes stick in auto-down mode...it would not always click back off on it's own when the window was fully down. Thought that might be the issue. BUT in installing a used Roady salvage yard switch, there was no change, window still stuck down.
I parked the Cruiser in the garage, window stuck down, all last week, and drove my Cutlass to work.
Well yesterday afternoon I caught the weather forecast, and they are calling for rain for Tues-Wed this week. I am not leaving my t-top Cutlass outside in the rain, so I sucked it up and went to Autozone for another new window motor.
On getting to Autozone, they did not have the driver's front motor in stock....not at that store, or anywhere in town. The Autozone motor would be a new Dorman brand, $41 for the front (was only $36 for the rear..weird).
I called Advance and O'Reilly, (Napa is closed Sunday evening) and neither had the new Dorman motor. Advance was nuts, wanted $69 for a new motor, and none in stock either. O'Reilly had both new for $59 and rebuilt for $46. I know one of the managers at O'Reilly, and told him I could get a NEW motor from Autozone for $41. He pulled it up online, and he said he'd match the price for a new one, but it would be a Cardone-brand motor, and he didn't have it in stock, but an O'Reilly down in Austin had it.
SO after a call to the O'Reilly down in Austin I headed into the city and 25-mins later had a new motor for $41 plus tax, and also got a new set of window rollers, and a set of bolts and nuts for the arm rest mount. Got home at dusk and tore into the car.
Now just a stupid observation...I have a nice big oversized 2-car garage and a nice 2-car carport, both lighted, and I ended up doing this job in my driveway with a droplight.
The GTO basket-case is sitting on two flat tires, so I can't roll it out of the garage, and with it in the garage, I can't fully open the door on the wagon without risking hitting it on the GTO. Ha! And to use the carport I'd have to hook up and pull out my little lake boat...and my Dad has the Ram with the hitch...the wagon does not have a hitch on it yet. Doh!!!
SO with a drop-light in hand I tore the door panel off by droplight in the dark driveway.
This job was a bit more of a pain than the rear door because the window was stuck fully down, and I could not easily get to the window rollers to pop them loose. Had to remove the plastic dust-sheeting and the door speaker. Plus it was hard to see inside the door...needed a 3rd arm to hold the light!
I finally got it all out. Drilled out the rivets, got the actuator arms off the track, and did end up removing the arm rest mount for more access.....which meant more rivet drilling.. Wheee!
On getting the motor and actuator out, I discovered the motor was a Napa rebuild unit.
Man that Napa motor smelled TERRIBLE too! I did not see any burned areas on the outside of the motor, but it stunk like burned brake pads. Whoo! Smelled BAD. I put the actuator in my bench vice before removing the motor....I learned my bloody lesson when I did the rear door motor. Had no urge to loose more skin to an actuator spring!!
I had a fleeting moment when I considered stopping and going to Napa the next day to see if the motor was under warranty, but I didn't want to leave the car torn apart. I did save the dead Napa motor and may go to Napa anyway...have a spare in case this happens again, if they will warranty it. One sniff and they'll know it's fried.
I installed the new Cardone motor on the actuator...still in the vice, and then bolted it all back in the door. I also removed the original-style sliders and installed new round rollers. MAKE SURE, for you who have not done this yet, to have some small clamps handy to pop the arms into the new rollers!
I did pull out the shop-vac and sucked all the metal shavings and drilled rivets out of the door bottom. I found a LOT of old rivet-parts down there in the door. Whoever did the motor job the first time did not bother to suck the original rivets out I guess. Glad there were no rattles!
I greased all the rails and pivot points, and bolted the speaker back on, followed by the plastic dust cover, and then bolted on the arm rest mount. The metal arm rest mount is added on top of the plastic. If you are riveting it on, this is simple. If you are bolting it back on, it's a pain. You have to reach under the plastic and inside the door to hold the nut as you hold the bolt and mount on the outside. Makes a really good case for rivets, but if this ever happens again I do not want to drill out rivets again...so went with bolts and nuts here.
I put the door panel back on. Now I really do not think there is anything wrong with the original window switch assembly...it looks brand new, is clean, and seems perfect. BUT just in case, I cleaned up the salvage yard switch assembly really well, made sure the chrome was spotless, and I also removed the plastic auto-down "arm" from the used switch. I hated that feature...the way they did it on these sucks compared to the LT1 Roady-style switches. Installed the modified new-used switch and checked that all the windows worked perfectly now, and then buttoned everything up.
SO here's a DONE pic from 11:45pm last night. All back together and tight. Such fun!
Hopefully the passenger-side windows will keep working. Knock wood!
-Mike