Electric Window Failure

I was out in the zed, then the clouds loomed over head... i put the hood up and then wound the windows up, only to be greeted by a grinding whirring noise and the window stopped working!

Luckily, I could pull it up by hand, but it looks like another trip to get the thing fixed!

When I got home i took the door card off and had a look inside, it looks like the wire rope thats pulled around the door to open and close the window has frayed and snapped. More worryingly, it looks as if it has been in water! Its all brown and rusty! Now with a monsoon hanging on the horizon, I can sit here knowing that the glass isn't 'nudged' up into the seal and having no garage, all i can do is throw a tarp over the blasted thing!

Pictures to follow...

Anyone else had any issue with this?

I assume its a complete new assembly rather than a 50p piece of wire rope! On the up-side, the motor still works smoothly, so at least i don't have to replace that!

Wattsie

I can't help, but I do have the same problem, on both windows!

You can hear the motor doing its thing but it sounds gravely and the window doesn't move, I haven't been brave enough to take the door card off but I bet it's the same

Sorry to hear but yes, it's a common problem and you have to buy the complete assembly.

There is a brand new repair kit on fleabay for £50 if any good?

Another 'common problem'! With wheels that crack, roof motors that are installed in puddles, window cables that snap, amps that get waterlogged, wipers that don't always return and dodgy gm5 modules, I'm beginning to think this 'well engineered' car isn't so well engineered! Good job it's sexy and sounds awesome!

I'll ask how much at my local Indy, but it looks simple enough to replace, so might splash on the eBay kit (well spotted andysat)

Chris_p I heard the gravelly noise just before the boing and snap.... It just sounds expensive to fix! Once it snapped the motor whirs smoothly, if its still gravely after the snap it might mean new motors! Can you push your windows down fully and pull them up by hand??

Wattsie

easy to do your self buy new regulator from bmw £152 see my listing on this site two weeks ago.or contact me for help

wattsie said:

Another 'common problem'! With wheels that crack, roof motors that are installed in puddles, window cables that snap, amps that get waterlogged, wipers that don't always return and dodgy gm5 modules, I'm beginning to think this 'well engineered' car isn't so well engineered! Good job it's sexy and sounds awesome!

I'll ask how much at my local Indy, but it looks simple enough to replace, so might splash on the eBay kit (well spotted andysat)

Chris_p I heard the gravelly noise just before the boing and snap.... It just sounds expensive to fix! Once it snapped the motor whirs smoothly, if its still gravely after the snap it might mean new motors! Can you push your windows down fully and pull them up by hand??

Wattsie

Click to expand...

Looks like I have the same problem as you.
I had a spare half hour so figured I'd give it a look, got the door card off etc to find this:



I was messing about with the buttons etc trying to work out what cable did what and now it's changed slightly! It's now the same as yours, where the window will drop all the way down if you push it and the same vice versa, motor constantly spinning and it's lost it's gravely noise! I preferred it how it was, at least it pushed into the seal before!

New regulator job then. Easy enough to fit?
The kit off eBay will do it ok?

Bingo! Exactly the same as mine!

I hope it's that easy to fix... Ordered the regulator kit this morning, will have a go at fitting once it turns up and I'll take lots of pics!

It's lashing it down in sunny Manchester at the moment and I keep going to check I don't have a puddle in my footwell!

chris_p said:

[/img]

I was messing about with the buttons etc trying to work out what cable did what and now it's changed slightly! It's now the same as yours, where the window will drop all the way down if you push it and the same vice versa, motor constantly spinning and it's lost it's gravely noise! I preferred it how it was, at least it pushed into the seal before!

Click to expand...

Oops!

wattsie said:

Bingo! Exactly the same as mine!

I hope it's that easy to fix... Ordered the regulator kit this morning, will have a go at fitting once it turns up and I'll take lots of pics!

It's lashing it down in sunny Manchester at the moment and I keep going to check I don't have a puddle in my footwell!

Click to expand...

Let me know how you get on mate!
Lots of photos, maybe even make a how to

Would be good to know/see how its done.

What's the difference in the eBay kit?
I'm only asking as its a lot cheaper! Is it just because its not an oem part?

From the outcome of this thread I'm either going to try it myself, or get a Indy to do it, and I don't want them getting funny about the kit as its not proper!

chris_p said:

What's the difference in the eBay kit?
I'm only asking as its a lot cheaper! Is it just because its not an oem part?
From the outcome of this thread I'm either going to try it myself, or get a Indy to do it, and I don't want them getting funny about the kit as its not proper!

Click to expand...

The ebay item is a cable repair kit that seems to replace the broken cable & clips, the BMW OE regulator is an all-in-one item which is not designed to be repairable.
http://tis.spaghetticoder.org/s/view.pl?1/08/08/45

I had the full regulator done but remember someone on the forum talking about using the repair kit but haven't heard how it went - anyone know? Personally I'm a bit dubious about the cable kit but maybe it's OK?

OK, so today the cable kit arrived....

Nice and clean, no instructions, but well packaged.

Now I was planning on doing a 'how to' on this, but because I had certain issues and used the wrong order to do things I don't think it will be much use! That and my phone ran out of battery about 10 minutes in!

The kit consisted of a length of cable with numerous bits of plastic and rubber outer tubes and a small winding reel to replace the old one.

Before this afternoon, I could raise and lower the window by grabbing it and moving it by hand, today I hit a pot hole that jarred the assembly and now its stuck! This made lowering the window to get to the glass bolt VERY difficult!

I ended up unbolting the regulator set to drop the rear of the glass to undo the glass bolt, which promptly jammed up.... much fiddling and swearing later I had the regulator set out and on the floor. If you didn't have my niggles, this would be a simple case of 5 bolts.

Having the regulator on the floor allowed me to check that all the replacement kits parts were in the right order etc.... all ok....

Next was to remove the motor and winding drum from the regulator. 3 bolts for the motor....easy.... 6 flanged fastenings for the winding drum....nightmare.... the bracket is punched throughout the plastic cover that holds the drum and these must be drilled out and replaced with bolts. This was not as simple as it sounds!

Once the drum was out and the snarled up wire removed with great force, I rigged up all the wires on the pulleys, attached the sliders, and tried to work out the correct number of turns to wind each end of the wire round the winding drum. This took nearly and hour of faffing, adjusting, thinking, faffing again and so on and so on.

After finally getting this right it was time to reinstall in the car. This was relatively simple but did involve a lot of groping round in the door itself to find sliders etc as it was now pitch black and I only had a willing helper holding an inspection light!

Moment of truth..... and it works... window goes up and down....relativley smoothly.

Next the heavens opened so I couldn't spend much time adjusting.... that will be tomorrow.... but it looks as if it will seal from the rain tonight... tarp over just in case.

Honest opinion... for the £60 for the kit and 5 hours of my time, this is a considerable saving over a new regulator set at £120+,and a load of labour time, but it does involve a lot of faffing around, and I am dreading the alignment bit tomorrow.

If my other window goes I will be taking it for someone else to do. Replacing the regulator was easy as this is less than 10 bolts, but the messing about with the winding drum which is obviously not user serviceable was a pain in the ass, with no idea of where to start regarding the winding as the old rum had ingested the cable!

I will post my findings on the adjusting bit tomorrow.....

Im off for a beer!

wattsie

I'm glad you got it fixed mate!
I think I may take mine to an Indy, sounds very fiddly and I'm not sure I have the time.

I am fairly sure this problem has just happened to my z4 (Drivers side). Any advice, I'm a relative novice with DIY car repairs. I have seen a youtube video where they cut away the fabric cover etc. Looks easy to mess up. What cost did you find from an INDY (not sure what that stands for, but I assume its a local car garage?).

I dont want to buy the wrong repair kit either, If I do take it to a garage with a part from ebay... This seems the right part? Can someone confirm? I have an E85.

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/BMW-Z4-Roadster-E85-E-86-Window-Regulator-Repair-Set-Front-Right-New-/141504923406?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_3&hash=item20f259c70e