Greg welded the PS bracket for me a few weeks ago. See my post about an extra brace we included to strengthen it. I painted the new welded area with Eastwood's cold galvanizing compound. (Looks like flat grey paint, not metallic at all). The black portions have been repainted where needed. The inside of the door was cleaned. The PW & lock & door latch mechanisms are sparkly with fresh lubricant! The inside of the door has been sanded in the rusty spots and repainted. The edges where the bolts had worn off the overspray have been repainted. The plastic cover piece over the lock mechanism (aft top inside door) has been cleaned & put back. The fuzzy glass rattle guides have been velcroed. The glass is back in and whaddyknow, it even goes up & down... FAST! YOWZA! Tomorrow I tackle the window up/down/in/out adjustments. It's not too far off for a first guess.

I've got a few tips:
1. After you remove all the bolts from the window glass, get the threaded slider stud off the glass with it down about 1/2 way (not up higher like the service manual implies). This gives more maneuvering room to get the glass off the front bolt. You must have the other 2 bolts out first.
2. When cleaning the latch / lock without removal stuff a BUNCH of newspapers inside the door to catch the drips.... and don't let it run forward, it's hard to get a hand up there to wipe the excess out. Be sure to put a rag under the back corner where all the goo will drain, and wipe it frequently so it doesn't damage the paint.
3. Don't loose the rubber backing on the little fuzzy (sorta like velcro) door rattle pieces. You'll never find that alone and will have to buy new pieces with metric screws. Carefully pull off the fuzzy part and epoxy the rubber then use outdoor industrial strength soft side of velcro over the old piece.
4. Make sure the anti rattle foam is on the power window motor between the motor and the black cover plate.
5. Don't overtighten the small cover plate bolts. Bubba did with mine and 2 of the 6 screws were missing... because he had stripped them I've since found out.
6. Spray cleaner into the round sliders (they have several little holes in them), you'll be amazed at how much black gunk comes out.
7. When reattaching the large horizontal bar, keep the front disconnected, raise the window all the way up. Then get the back piece connected to the back vertical rail. Then slide the horizontal bar forward onto the front X piece.
8. While all the innards are out, look up at the horizontal metal channel which backs the outside top of the door. Mine had some surface rust over the factory overspray. I sanded & painted it while the doors were empty. You'll never see the rusting when looking down into the door from the top glass channel.
9. If the inside horizontal rod for the door latch or the outer edge vertical rod for the door lock clunks rotate their rubber rings 180 degrees and move their position about an inch one way or the other. Put some lubricant on the door itself where this rubber piece slides to prevent squeaking.
10. Put the clip on the Motor bracket to hold the PW wire after it's assembled & bolted & plugged in. That way you can get the wires facing the right direction and not bent. It's a bear to get back off in those limited quarters when inside.

Well, one down, one more to go.

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~Juliet ...overlooking Mill Creek on the Chesapeake Bay...
Loaded Bridgehampton Blue on Blue '70 350/300Hp TH400 with a White Ragtop

Congratulations are in order!

Thanks for the tips. I've cut and pasted them so I'll have them if I ever need to fool with the door glass. Now get some rest, you're up way late.

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GTR
Wallingford,CT
'69 350,4 spd,3:36 conv.
'72 350,TH400,3:08 coupe.

...Or maybe I could remove the doors and ship them to you for repair?
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Later,
Mack76
76ZZ4

[This message has been edited by Mack76 (edited 02-21-2000).]

I compiled my glass & PW mechanism removal procedure for a friend but thought some of you might also benefit from it... plus in a few weeks time when I get to the other door & have forgotten how I did the first I'll be able to search the archives for a memory jog.

Don't reach inside with the keys in the ignition ON the PW gear / spring can take out fingers etc. You'll need a 2nd set of hands to support the glass.... or at least I did! Basically you need to remove the 3 bolts holding the glass in place before it will come out.

You need to take the interior door panels off & the cover on the PW assy. The short horizontal slider (about 8") needs to be unbolted. Also remove the 1" x 2" fuzzy things attached to the top inside edge. I loosened them and dropped them down and fished them out the bottom. Then raise /lower the window so that you have access to the 2 bolts which hold the glass to the horizontal slider bar which is attached to the X on the PW mechanism. These you get to with a nut driver through the 2 access holes (easy). You get one, then move the window up / down to get the other one lined up. Those are the 2 aft bolts... piece of cake.

Then the tough one... in front which has a bolt in the front vertical slider which goes through a hole in the glass. Pay attention to the washer / rubber gasket sequence. You'll need to reach inside and around to the outside of the glass to unbolt this. It's a stud on the teflon (?) slider thing and doesn't come out easily. I was able to fit a small socket wrench in there to loosen it & then used just my fingers so I didn't loose all the washers etc.

Once the glass is unbolted (but the stud is still through the fwd hole) you can lift up the rear side and tilt the top front inwards (bottom near the stud outwards) to disconnect it from the captive bolt on the front vertical slider. That's the hard part & I suspect if one's not careful they can break a corner off the front of the glass. It helps to have a hand inside to guide and someone else tilting the glass.

Once the glass is out the rest is straight forward (patience& juggling required to manipulate it out the little access hole). You probably want to remove the front & rear vertical sliders (easy) for more maneuvering room inside before you tackle the PW motor & bracket assy. Very last unbolt the PW brackets. The service manual says to do this early on but it just screws things up. Then disconnect the wire & don't forget the wire is also in a clip on the front of the bracket. Remove the long horizontal bar & the short horizontal bar so all you have is the PW assy & the big "X". Then that can be slid forward so you get the back end of the X out the back of the door & it follows with the front which has the bracket & motor.

Before you take the mechanism to the workbench, adjust the actuator height so that you can bolt the gear to the backing plate (safety issue). That spring is VERY STRONG. You can probably do this outside the car with the power plugged in as it's *imperative* before you take apart the rest of the mechanism. I didn't disassemble any further so I left that step out. My understanding is that to disassemble (like if you need to replace gear) you need to drill out rivets. I didn't need to do that. I just cleaned, lubed and welded the bracket (all as one component).

Any more questions just holler while it's still fresh in my mind. I think I got this all written down correctly. ~Juliet

Oh, yeah... Can you kinda make it fast? I'm looking kinda funny, drivin' around without any doors. One kid asked me if I was a mail man...

------------------
Later,
Mack76
76ZZ4

BFrance, yes my windows were slow. Actually that's an understatement. They were hopelessly ANEMIC! I would have to open the door and grab the glass and lift them up with my finger on the PW button the last 3 inches. The other reason I needed to tackle the project is because of a heavy duty door clunk! The slowness was due to goopy, stickey, dried up old lubricant and the clunk was the broken power window bracket allowing the HEAVY motor to clunk back & forth inside the door, merely suspended from the top 2 bolts. The broken bracket also allowed the PW motor & bracket to rotate and rip open & elongate the lower bracket bolt hole on the interior metal. This also caused the alignment of the mechanism to be off slightly. I'm sure that contributed to the slow glass motion, though probably to a lesser degree.

Mack, OK sure! I can handle it! No need to send ca$h. Just put a certified check in the mail (if you ever want to see your doors again.) Since my spare time is booked between now and my retirement date (just around the corner, in 2025) I'll need to take unpaid work leave if it's a rush job. So if I give you a 25% discount on my internal job billing rate that would put the door restoration work somewhere in the $85 / hour range. ...and I should also mention that perfection is achieved REALLY REALLY SLOWLY! LOL! Now if you're willing to wait till my schedule clears up we can cut that hourly rate down even further. I figure I can always sell a set of nicely restored doors off a '76 on eBay if that check somehow gets lost in the mail.

At least you didn't say that the neighborhood kids thought you looked funny driving around without your drawers. ~Juliet

Along those same lines, you might want to check the weatherstripping at the top of the door opening. Maybe it's compressed too much or the wrong kind or something (??) again requiring the glass up to high. If you have a T-top that might also apply. ??? I'm just throwing out some ideas here....

How come you get to retire so early? I figger I'm done in 2047.... I'll be 100.

Oh yeah... I sent the doors air-freight collect... Lemme know when you get 'em...

Like I said... Money is no object... Charge it to General Motors, Inc. DEtroit, Mich.

Karl, Thanks, I've already tried the stainless wire trick. It's holding OK in 2 places. I'll find out about the others when I get the right screws. BTW, I got the vette in December. I decided to keep the Pony car too though. Since the vette has only 45k mi (had 44k when I got it ) and I'm the second owner, and it's got a pretty high % of original stuff on it I just couldn't bring myself to do the daily thing with all the looney drivers in DC.

Mack, I thought the whole idea was to get out early while you still had some livin' in ya!

~Juliet

I performed a search on all 'door' threads and found your name with the majority. Have saved them for reference during my planned door rebuild. Thanks for posting this info.

Thanks!