Has anyone ever removed the regulator for the window in the driver's side door? The RAVE CD isn't that great for me as far as the finer points of getting it in and out and I have never had to do something like this ever.

Also, is it possible that something just came loose or am I looking at a new regulator? I can hear the motor working when I up/down the window toggle, but nothing is budging at all with the window. The motor doesn't seem to be laboring. It's just whirling like it's become detached from the regulator?

 

its possible the motor is loose or that the teeth on the regulator or motor are broken or worn down.

in either case the regulator and motor need to be removed to check and fix. unbolt the regulator from the door frame and separate from the glass. you have to snake it out and you will spot the problem right away. bent arm on the regulator, moose motor mount bolts, or a busted motor gear. in any case it will be easily obvious

 

Thanks Sloppy Joe. That doesn't sound to bad. I'm going to guess it's the motor gear that fell off? The thing was working perfectly then just outta the blue...nothing. Seems I would have heard something if something was bending or seizing or burning out. God I hope it's that simple. THANK YOU for the help/advice. I will report the findings/fixes tomorrow.

 

its really not too bad. i have replaced the reg in my passenger window. everything comes apart fairly easily and in a somewhat logical (for a land rover) manner.
usually when a regulator goes,,, it goes in a fantastic fashion of crunching and twisted metal sounds.


let us know.

 

OK, I got my drivers side window fixed. Below details the journey just in case a rookie like me has this same problem in the future. Hope this helps and makes sense.

I got the drivers side door panel off pretty easily. Six screws total and easy to find. Prying the panel off from the little plastic things that hold the edges of the rest of the panel to the door wasn't as easy but it did break free with some damage to those little plastic...um...I guess I will call them rivets. The speaker wire plug is then easily disconnected. You might want to tuck that wire somewhere safe. At one point I shut the door and almost smashed that plug.

At this point the whole door has a plastic sheet as a vapor barrier between the door and the door panel. I highly suggest using a razor blade to cut this plastic sheet so that when you are done, you can easily duct tape this plastic sheet back into place. I just ripped it away and it made a mess of things when I decided I still wanted it there. I had to use a lot of duct tape. If I would have been patient and made one cut, it would have been a lot better.

From there, there were six visible bolts that hold the regulator (which you can't see at this point beyond what peeks through the access holes) to the inside of the door.

It helps to first remove the two bolts holding the window into the regulator channel (if the window is in the down position like mine was) and manually pulling the window up and out of the way. I secured the now loose window in the up position with a couple of cloths pins wedged between the window and the weather stripping where the window and the door meet.

I then removed the 6 bolts holding the regulator to the inside of the door. Once it is free, maneuver it around and look for the wire and plug that goes to the motor in the little hole near the door handle. Disconnect it with a standard screwdriver. You might also pull the wire plug out of that little hole so you can find it easily when you put everything back together.

From there the regulator with attached motor comes out pretty easily. I had to play around with it a little bit but it wasn't maddening.

I got the whole assembly out and what happened was the half circle set of gears on the regulator assembly had simply gone past where the last teeth were. This is where I became confused. What is supposed to stop the motor from going to far on the half circle regulator gear? I removed the three star bolts holding the motor to the regulator assembly, remarried the teeth of the motor gear to the teeth of the half circle regulator assembly, put the three star bolts holding the motor to the regulator assembly back in and reassembled the whole thing back into the door.

Everything worked fine as far as up/down with the window, but when I let the window automatically re-open all the way without me stopping it, once again the motor just kept going until it ran out of teeth on the regulator half circle part. I was right back where I started with the window motor no longer able to engage the teeth on the regulator. The motor was once again spinning in the wind.

I looked everything over very carefully and could not figure out what is supposed to stop the window from opening to far. I searched inside the door panel looking for anything that might have fallen off. Nothing. The only thing I could have done was pull the other panel off the passenger side door to compare but I didn't want to do that because of the plastic vapor barrier sheet that you have to rip apart to get access. I didn't want to deal with doing damage to the passenger side door.

So here is what I did. At the bottom inside the door, there are two metal tabs about where the bottom of the window rests when fully open. They are on both sides on the front and back of the door and they have holes in them. Maybe this is where something is supposed to be to stop the window when in the down position? I don't know. But I took a 2" X 2" piece of pine and cut it to 29". I drilled two holes on both ends and bolted this piece of pine between the two tabs.

Now when the window comes down, the bottom of it hits the pine, which stops the window and kills the motor. It's not perfect. Now the window sticks up about an inch and a half and makes resting my arm on the door when I'm out driving around a little uncomfortable, but at least it won't go down so far that the teeth on the regulator assembly become disengaged from the motor gear. I may go back in and do some tweaking, but it's good enough for now.

In conclusion, this fix isn't all that bad and I would rate it easy for the non-mechanical type. The worst part was those plastic "rivets" you have to deal with when pulling the door liner off after the screws are removed. I would also suggest using a razor blade or something to cut the plastic vapor barrier off the door so it can be duct taped back on easily. I kind of ripped my to shreds. Other than that, it's a fairly simple fix.

I still don't know why my window suddenly started opening to far. If anybody knows what is supposed to stop the window, I would love to know. But for now, I have a Rover made of steel, aluminum and pine.

Thank you all for the help. Especially you Sloppy Joe.

 

Here's another cool thing that happened here. I went to ebay and found the front drivers side regulator listed with a "buy it now" price of 60 bucks. BUT it also said "Make an offer". Because my window was still kind of working (and because I am still kind of broke) I offered 40 bucks. They accepted.

The regulator came quickly and well packaged and WITH the motor. I was blown away because these are 125 bucks at Roverland parts WITHOUT the motor. So I fixed my window for 40 bucks and now have a motor to sell that go for more than 40 bucks on ebay a lot of the time. I got paided to fix my Rover?!?!?

The guy has other stuff to. Here is a link to Land Rover stuff on his store on Ebay...just please don't buy the stuff I'm going to need in the future haha. http://stores.ebay.com/Bill-Smith-Auto-Parts

http://stores.ebay.com/Bill-Smith-Auto-Parts

 

Thanks for the information about removing a door panel to check on a stuck window. I got started, but couldn't figure out how to remove the panel off of the inside door handle (left front). Can anyone help? Thanks!

 

It's a little tricky. There is a screw in the little black (your color might be different) insert behind the metal handle you pull to open the door. Once it's out the little black insert the screw came out of can be pulled away from the rest of the door panel. I remember turning the little black insert 180 degrees and kind of twisting it around the metal handle. I think I pulled the metal handle open like you are opening the door as I twisted the little insert around trying to get it free? It's kind of a Rubics Cube trick but it does come off and then the actual door panel comes off very simply. Getting the black insert thing back on is a little easier though because now you kind of know it will even though it's gonna be kinda tricky. Hope this helps and good luck, Bob

 

Next time use one of these to remove the door panel.