Window Regulator Replacement

[ZeroLux]

Hey guys,

Couple of days ago my drivers' side window regulator decided it didn't want to live anymore and quit on me. Problem I have is the window is stuck approx halfway down, can't move it in either direction no matter what I do. This is annoying, especially since we have had a very rainy summer here this year.

I had planned on going to the junkyard tomorrow to fish for a new one to replace this with but I've run into some questions.

How does this come out? I've done regulators before, I see the bolts that hold it in (looks to be about 3), and the little window at the bottom left corner to remove it through, thing I am wondering is how the window track separates from the glass and/or the unit comes out without effin' up something else.

It looks to have a scissor motion type of lever inside hooked to the regulator and I can't see enough to figure out how to remove it. By my own admission, I didn't spend a great deal of time messing with it since I had other things to fix today. Anyone have an exploded diagram of the inside of the door I could look at?

Also considering the idea that it might not be the regulator even though all of the other windows work properly. Checked the switch panel, no problems there, not sure if that window alone would have it's own fuse or not. Seems kinda dumb if it does. Have I missed anything before I put myself through a lot of trouble getting this apart?

Is there a way to manually move this window up or down, assuming to get the glass off I'd have to remove a few screws from the channel the glass sits in?

Any help is appreciated, thanks!

Z

[charliekuney]

Be careful removing the silver trim piece on the top of the door panel that sits flush to the window. They bend/break real easy. Talk to mykwikcoupe about manually rolling the window up. He gave me a run-through, but it's all on my phone.

[AccordB20A]

Ive done it before by undoing the bolts. all of them around the reg and theres anothert couple inline with each other further along to the back of the car you should be able to drop the window down enough to get at the two bolts that bolt the glass to the regulator. you can then pull the window out, and pull the old reg out thru the hole in the door. installs the same but backwards. front doors are easy as pie its the rears that cunt you around a bit.

[LX-incredible]

Did you check the window relay in the drivers door? Those are pretty prone to failure.

If the motor is shot, you'll probably need to remove it from the regulator to get the damn thing to retract.

[charliekuney]

If the motor is shot, you'll probably need to remove it from the regulator to get the damn thing to retract.

Let me talk to Mike, because the way he explained it, there wasn't much more than taking the door panel off and ruining that damn trim piece...

[LX-incredible]

Yes, if the window is down it's just the door panel and 5 bolts, 3 for the regulator and 2 for the glass. It's a bit of a bitch when the window is up though, regulator won't fit through the hole in the door.

[Dr_Snooz]

I can't imagine the regulator would just quit. If it was working fine and then spontaneously stopped, I'd look for electrical explanations.

...unless it spontaneously stopped after someone creamed the side of the car...

[nfs480]

My drivers side window stopped working and the culprit turned out to be the power window control unit located underneath the passenger seat. Only my driver's side failed to function, the rest functioned normally.

[ZeroLux]

Under the passenger's seat? I don't recall anything being there... nor does the FSM I have. Either way I'd like to figure out what is wrong with it, having the window stuck half-down is a bit of a pain.

If it matters to anyone: upon reading the FSM, it said to test the servo by disconnecting the 4P connector from the control module in the door, which I did, and then give it 12v and reverse it to see if there is any movement. None. I assume those four wires go directly to the regulator motor and bypasses all the other mess. Like I said, no movement or even the sound of an attempted movement. So to me that means the motor went dead. And for a little back history, it's not really "sudden", it's done this before but miraculously started working again several hours/minutes/days later. I'd say it's done that roughly about a dozen times now in the last few months. Not to mention it was also horribly SLOOOOOOW at moving the window in either direction. I checked for drag from the seal, that wasn't causing it, and I also noticed the scissor lift that it's on has really bad bushings in it, causing my window to shift forward whenever I put it up, usually leaving a small (less than 1/4 inch) gap on the back edge by the B pillar.

Apparently this door was abused, and that's expected from 20 year old parts, the exterior door handle has also broken within the last week or two, leaving me to get in the car from the passengers side. The little circular metal tab on top of the handle mechanism inside broke off and the arm it pushed down just hangs free now. I knew this was coming, just a matter of a run to the junkyard when I have some free time to fix that.

Basically my whole damned door is falling apart. Yay.

Z

[LX-incredible]

2 of the 4 wires go to a switch in the back of the motor, to signal the controller when it's stopped.

[ZeroLux]

Yeah I did some probing into all of that. Here's the problem as it stands now. I spent all morning in the local pick-n-pull, yanked two VERIFIED working assemblies out of an 88 LXi and another 89 LXi, got the owner of the place to let me go into the parking lot and connect them to the car to test.... nothing still. WTF? What the heck could be going wrong here. I tried the two motor assemblies and two other black box control modules where it connects to and I got nothing. The other 3 windows work fine from the driver's side control panel but the drivers window is still dead. Checked the fuses (who's brilliant idea was it to put a fuse for each window?) tried the relay in the main fuse box, I'm stumped.

Anyone have any more thoughts on this? The FSM I have is either incomplete or not thought out very well considering the section for the windows is maybe 2 pages tops and isn't very detailed.

Z

[LX-incredible]

Switch or bad wires in the connecting door to body. I'll have a look at a wiring diagram.

[ZeroLux]

Thanks. I already took apart the switch unit, contacts were clear, seemed to be working properly as far as continuity is concerned. Reassembled and installed back into the car without the door panel. Locks and lock switch still works for all four, so I am thinking power is getting to the door fine, it just almost feels like the window itself isn't getting power. Unfortunately my multimeter broke yesterday while I was working on something unrelated so I guess it's time to go buy a new one.

Z

[ZeroLux]

OK. Some new info here. The enigma that is my car's electrical system appears to have a gremlin. Maybe someone can shed some light on the subject, as the current symptoms have left me with nothing.

About 11pm last night, on my way home, I felt like attempting the switch again. Behold, it moved. Like an idiot however instead of putting it all the way up when I could, i told my fiancee whom was in the passengers seat "HEY LOOK" and about that time it stopped, just 2 inches short of the top. Would not go any further up nor down. Ok... at least that's a little better.

I left it as-is because by that time I had arrived at my driveway and didn't feel like messing with it further. Motor is good. I'm thinking a bad ground or a wiring short somewhere. It's been raining all night so who knows what might have triggered it to function again and then suddenly stop. I have a theory, I'll get to that in a moment...

So just now, quarter after four in the morning (I work a 3rd shift job, so night time is nothing new to me), I finish up a movie and decide to go tinker with it again. Still raining, thankfully the thick plastic sheeting I placed over the opening in the window kept the water out. I put the key in, and toggle the switch to move the window up... it moved slightly, struggled, and stopped. Second attempt, I used my left hand to push up on the inside of the glass and triggered the switch again, moved more, but still stopped short of it's final destination. I believe the expression on my face varied between o.O and :/ for those that are into emoticons. The third time around I gave the switch another bump, just to see if the last 1/2 inch gap would close in and this time was greeted with a buzzing sound from the exposed door shell. Odd. Was it the motor? I placed my hand on the door and used the switch again, tracing the vibration back to the buzzing sound. It was the Power Window Control module. The one installed in the car right now is the original, I figure something inside might be borked. Thankfully while at the junkyard this morning I managed to grab another as a test spare in case it was ever needed. It was in the back seat, so I grabbed it and swapped the 4P and 6P connectors over to it and let it hang. Tried the switch again- exact same buzzing sound and mild vibration coming from the control box now resting on my right knee.

Short story long, I tinker with it some more and managed to close the gap to an acceptable distance (less than 1/4 inch) and called it a night.

Now... my question: what would cause these symptoms? The theory I mentioned before involves what I believe (if I understood correctly before) is a switch of some sort on the motor that signals to the car when the window has reached the full up or full down position. What are the chances that switch might be bad? What would the effect be other than the obvious lack of motion in the window? What caused the buzzing noise? I've thought about taking the spare control module apart and seeing what was inside just for reference.

I read somewhere about having a bad ground might cause the window to not move but I have yet to trace anything out for lack of knowing where to start or look. In the event that the switch on the motor is bad, is it replaceable on it's own or does that involve replacement of the whole unit?

Another thing I can't figure out is why when I applied 12v worth of power to the motor directly before by way of the 4P connector the window did not move at all. My initial assumption was that the sealed lead acid battery I used to test that didn't have adequate amperage to engage the motor all the way.

What am I doing wrong here? What the heck is up with this door? Anybody have any thoughts, I feel that I've run out at the moment.

Z

[w261w261]

From my experience, when the window goes down but won't go up, it's the window control unit. Mine started not working sometimes, but if I would push the window switch hard it would eventually go, so I thought it was just dirty. I then took out the switches, took them apart, and cleaned them all. No work. Finally I bought a new window relay (about $100 if I recall), and things were fixed, and have stayed fixed.

I opened up the old relay box to see if one could be repaired, and remember thinking that the coils inside are just too small and too tucked in to make a fix worthwhile. If they are like most mechanical relays, the contacts become corroded over time and eventually die. They will respond to cleaning, but these guys might require a jeweler's loupe, a small vice, and some kind of thin emery cloth or a pick to get at the contacts. Too much trouble for me.

Are you sure that the "working" control unit that you swapped in was really ok? Because the symptoms you're having sounds an awful lot like the control unit relays which fail intermittently, then don't work at all.

If the window is still down some, try this: with the ignition power off, unplug both plugs from the controller. On the 6 wire plug, jump between the black/yellow wire (should be hot with ignition on and the window switch pushed to up position), and the red/yellow wire on the 4-connector plug (to the motor-up) . On the 4 connector plug, jump between the red/blue wire (return from motor) and the black wire on the 6-connector plug (to ground). Turn on the car's juice, and hit the window up switch. If the window goes up, the problem is the controller. If it doesn't, then you might need a DVM to go further. Let us know.

If the window is up, to get it down jump between the black/yellow on the 6 connector and the red/blue on the 4 connector. The ground jump is the same as above.

I have an American Honda Motor Company book, "Honda Electrical Troubleshooting Manual 1989," which contains full-page schematics and brief trouble-shooting write-ups. PM me your email address and I'll scan the driver's door window pages and send them to you.

PS: you might want to make sure all the contacts of the plugs and controller are not dirty.

[ZeroLux]

Well, it was stuck completely really. Not just a problem with one direction, it would not move in either direction. I did what you have listed above and got nothing again, but interestingly enough when I reattached it to the control box, it worked fine again after that. It's still working at the moment, but I am not sure for how long. Thankfully I got the window up all the way this morning enough to get the door handle off the outside of the car and fix that. Yay for being able to open the car door from the outside again! Bit of a pain though, had to drill out the pins that held the handle part on to swap a new handle onto the frame containing my original lock cylinder (i could not get the old cylinder out of the handle from the donor car), couple of 10/32 x 1.25 screws later and some fighting with a tight spring and all is well again.

Thanks for the suggestions guys, I'm sure it's not fixed right now and it will eventually screw up again in time. I'll keep tinkering with it until I figure it out I guess.

Z