1989 S4

Here is what happened.

Left the drivers-side window down a tad during the day by mistake and it basically froze in that position as it got colder out. Window would go down, but only come back up as far as it was left open.

After playing with it for a bit, I noticed the door "bulging" as the window went down/up. The glass was being pushed out, making it hard to move up and down. Looked down into the door and saw what appeared to be a bent arm from the motor to window. Then,...."bang"....something snaps and the window drops into the door.

Took the panel off in the cold last night and propped the window up in the closed position for the night (note - a bar of soap with a couple layers of electrical tape is the perfect size to jam under the window guide piece to keep the window in the closed position.......hey, I had limited resources last night ).

Now, the white "wheel" is still attached to the arm....I suspect I need to somehow slide this back into the slot on the window???

I also need to remove the motor/arm and pull it out of the door and straighten the arm. Is it supposed to have a "bend" in it, or is it pretty much straight?

With the window motor in the fully "up" position, the arm appears to not be all the way up......probably due to the bend in it?

Any tips would be great! Did a search, but most problems seem to arise when the white wheel thing snaps off of the motor arm....but mine is still attached.

 

I am positive you will need to pull the bend out of that arm. You will then have to undo the 3 bolts holding the armature and motor to the door to be able to get it back into the groove on the window.

 

So, once the motor is removed from the door (and I pull it out and straighten the arm), I can slide the white wheel back into the slot before bolting the motor back to the door? Makes sense.

I'm just worried about how straight the arm is supposed to be?

 

just get it as straight as you can and you should be fine,

to pull it right out of the door you may have to remove the electric motor off the back of the system, again another 3 bolts.

 

Yes...I see the bolts that hold the motor to the door. I suspect the motor and arm will come out of the large hole, more towards the rear of the door?

Is it hard to remove any wiring attached to the motor?

Thanks for the help!!

 

I had this same issue.............bent arm.

Rather than straighten the arm I replaced it..............hope you have small hands/arms.

 

Could you tell me if the new arm was perfectly straight? In reading some searched threads, I remember someone mentioning that the arm has a slight bend in it normally. I guess I'll find out when I try to put the arm wheel back into the track on the window.

I haven't had time to go out and play around with it, but it's going to be nice tomorrow, so I'm going back in.

 

To be accurate the replacement arm was used and IIRC it was straight.

In my case it was the passenger window and for some reason the white wheel came off the track and the glass fell down part way. In attempts to raise and lower the window the arm got mangled, as in bent in 2.

 

you may need to take the motor off the arm mechanism,
make it straight as you can,

the wires are not too hard to remove though you may wish to pry them up from the bottom with a screwdriver.

 

Thats what I did and couldn't figure out another way. Even with the motor off there's a lot of 'wigglin'' involved to R&R the arm mechanism.

Not as bad as the handle repair but its almost there.