Trev’s Tips

Windows (of opportunity)

This month I’ve decide my article needed to go back to the main reason I started this column, which was to offer tips on how to repair some common faults or easy DIY’s to Pajeros. 

This is one article I’ve been meaning to write for months but I’ve just been a bit side tracked lately with other topics such as the bloodygood idea, which by the way I got to test in anger last month and it worked a treat.  I recovered my vehicle from a sticky situation (bellied out on the apex of a sand dune with wheels spinning freely in the air) in 15 – 20 mins which I’m guessing would have taking me (and a long handled shovel) the best part of an hour to rectify otherwise.  For the record, after getting stuck at Crayfish Bay whilst on the Steep point trip (thanks for the snatch John S) and then being stuck on 2 other separate occasions on the Quobba coast line in the weeks after this in spots that I have previously made it through with ease I have decided that those rubbishy little tyres I had on at the time will never see the off road again.  Don’t let anyone ever tell you that tyres are not that important off road.  They are critical, so from now on for off road purposes I’ll be going back to my trusted 31x10.5r15 all terrains and maybe something bigger when they wear out.

Anyway, back to the story.  I get the impression that I may be talking to myself for this months Trev’s Tip, which is on repairing electric windows, because after the clubs annual dinner last weekend I made the sad discovery that I am now close to having the oldest car in the club so chances are that everybody else with their nice new shinny 4wd’s will probably never have this problem (hopefully).  Here it is anyway just in case this problem does happen to you because it will save big dollars in having someone else repair it for you.

When I first bought my car, although I didn’t realise it at the time, the rear passenger electric window was not working.  As it turns out this suited me because it meant I never had the problem of the kids winding the window up and down for entertainment on long country trips.  However, me being me, couldn’t live with the fact that something was not working properly on the car so I decided that I would take a peak at it to see if the problem was an easy fix that I could manage myself.

After a bit of playing I discovered that if you listened carefully you could actually hear the electric motor engaging when you pushed the up/down button it just seemed that the window was stuck.  This indicated that there was nothing wrong with the power getting to the motor, but after much time trying to free the window it refused to budge.  It was at this point I decided that I would take the motor out, pull it apart and try to figure out how this mystifying thing worked. 

Firstly the door trim needed to come off to get at the motor.  This is how that happens.

1. Remove the small screw in behind the opening handle.

2. Remove the ash trash and you will find another screw behind this that needs to come out.

3. On the door grab handle there are two plastic caps that each cover screws.  These caps can be gently levered off with a blunt instrument to expose screws behind.

4. Then gently pulling on the door trim the clips that hold this in place to the actual metal door frame will pop off.

5. The door trim should now be loose and can be lifted upwards over the locking button.  It should come away from the door but you will then need to disconnect the quick release clip from the wiring harness that provides power to the up/down control switch.

6. You can now gently peel back the plastic dust sheet, being careful not to rip, it which will expose the internals of the door.

I was now at a stage where I could clearly see the motor but was not sure how to remove it.  I began by removing three large screws thatretained the motor to the metal door frame (these are very obvious to spot) but could not get any further.  I then decided to partly dismantle the motor whilst it was still in the door.  The first thing I removed was a black cylindrical tube (shown in my hand in the photo above) from the top of the motor which was held on by two screws.  I latter discovered that this is actually a large magnet.  Underneath this was a mass of copper wiring which I think is called an armature.  Quite by accident I found that if I physically took hold of this armature and turned it the window would manually go up and down.  Progress.  I noticed at the time that this armature was quite stiff to turn initially but freed up slightly after some coaxing.

From here on I was stumped on what my next step in the repair process would be because it did not appear that the motor was able to be dismantled any further.  After an hour of playing I gave up in dismay resigning myself to the fact that I was going to have to get an auto electrician to look at the problem for me.  I put everything back together (amazingly no bolts were left over) and then to my great surprise the window started working when I pushed the up/down button.

Not knowing what I had done to fix the problem, I considered this just good luck and left it at that.  However 2 weeks latter the window stopped working again.  With renewed vigour I decided to tackle the repair again.  Going through the same steps as previously I again became stumped on how to get the actual motor apart, so once again had to give up.  Only this time I decided to spray some silicon lubricant into the motor to free up the armature which had again become very hard to turn.  Surprise, surprise after spraying the lubricant the armature significantly freed itself and turned easily in its housing.

I put it all back together and pushed the up/down button and the window operated perfectly.  This all happened about 18 months ago and the window hasn’t faulted since.  So there you go, after all that messing around trying to find an obvious problem it appears the problem was that the motor mechanism was just a bit frozen up and a bit of lubricant fixed it.

Obviously I can’t guarantee that if your electric windows ever stop working this will be what’s wrong but at least its worth a look before shelling out your hard earned money to expensive experts and you might even learn something in the process, or perhaps you’ll find that $20 bill that got lost in the car many months ago and never reappeared.

Till next time

Happy 4wding

Trevor

Confused as a hungry baby in a topless bar.