Cadillac Repair: Driver Window Slide, service garage, ball joint

Question

Window Slider Part When the window goes up and down, there's a part that cotroils this by sliding horizontally left & right(white piece), that is attached to black piece that is cogged, which goes vertically up& down (see attached photo of part).  Any idea on how to get the broken part off (whitre piece broke off from ball joint).  It's attached to the verticle rail and slotted metal belt within. Since it does not go all the way to bottom end of rail (toward front of door), how do you remove old and install new piece??

Answer
Hello,

I did many of these repairs years ago and assuming you have never done this repair, it's not for the novice. You are dealing with the window regulator. The cogged plastic is known as the window regulator tape. The tape can be purchased at the dealer and is not real expensive. The tape is run out of the motor and the new one goes indide the "V" of the channel and is fed back into the motor. The pivot piece you are showimg attaches to the channel.

I really would recommend taking it to a service center. You already have the trim panel off. You could run into problems where the regulator and motor have to come out and I doubt if you have the special very large 1/4" rivet gun and rivets you need to reattach the parts. I have one that has sat idle in my tool box for 12 years.

If your lucky a guy at a service garage could do all this for you for about $50 plus parts.

I realize since you took the trim panel off that you probably figure you can tackle this and I respect that. Over the years I changed thousands of glasses and repaired many of the broken tapes. I had the tools and knowledge and yet, now I would let someone else do it, just to keep the frustration factor down. As I said, you already have the trim panel off and you will put it back on. That in itself saves you an hour labor.

My major concern is you can get in trouble here real quick. I hope you heed my advice and have it done. You don't have to go to the dealer and get your eyeballs ripped out.

If you anticipate doing your own work on the car for this and anything else, I would highly suggest you go tp http://www.alldata.com , pay the $25 for membership. Find your exact car and download the info. You will find every bit of factory infprmation on your car. Its like downloading every factory service manual for your car. This is not like Chilton, Motors, Haynes etc. This is the factory info for your car!

In fact, if you want to know exactly what parts with blow ups and instructions related to your window, I believe it is all ther, but you don't have the $200 rivet gun and the instructions and description sounds easier than it is.

I do not get compensated for my answers, nor do I get anything for plugging alldata, but I use alldata all the time because the information will give me the answers I need for a specific vehicle.
If you take your car to a service center or an even cheaper place for repair of the regulator, do me a favor and drop me a line at robo14@aol.com and just tell me what it cost to repair the regulator.

Also, if my suggestions helped, would you be so kind to rate my answer?

Thanks,

Rob