Fixing Power Windows

I've had a small problem with my power windows: the motor could not lift the window all the way up. I had to help the motor a bit with my hand. While reading the Finnshark forum, I found an explanation that this is caused by the spring in the window mechanism. It needs to be preloaded by half circle to be powerful enough for the window. The annoying bit is that to do this, you need to pretty much disassemble the whole window mechanism...

Well, all I had was time so off to work. I began from the passenger side as it was still missing the window motor. I ordered one almost eight months ago but still had not received it. First I loosened the two nuts that held the window in place and lifted it out. Getting everything else out was simple job of unscrewing a few bolts.

Preloading the spring was also pretty easy. I turned the window regulator over until I could just put the spring in place. Then loaded it by using the arm as leverage. Putting the mechanism back in the door was a bit trickier now that the spring was loaded. I handled that by putting a zip tie around the arms. Now I could put the glass back in and finally tune all the settings so it moved correctly.

The driver side was the same deal. Only this time I also put the motor in. I tested it and now the window rose all the way up without problems. So the passenger side should also work when I get the new motor.

Passenger Side Emergency Brake

I was messing around the garage tonight and decided to check the passenger side emergency brake. I jacked the Corvette and removed the caliper as before.

Everything went smoothly and I started checking the system. This time the brake mechanism itself was OK but the shoes were not that good. Most likely they had been dragging for some time and overheated. This had opened some cracks in the lining. They were still in one piece though so I decided to put everything back together and hope they would last my light use.

Finally I adjusted the shoes and put the wheel back. I didn't take the car for a test drive but the emergency brake handle was quite firm now so hopefully this problem is finally solved.

Emergency Brake Problems

Like mentioned in the previous post, my emergency brake was not working properly. Because of this the car failed its inspection and could not be driven any more. Luckily the driving season was pretty much over already so I decided to leave the fix for later. This was a month ago so I thought that now would be a good time.

As tuning just the cable or adjusting the shoes through the hole in the brake disk didn't work, I needed to see the mechanism itself. This required me to remove the brake caliper and disk. The driver side was worse according to the inspectors, so I began there.

I removed the two bolts that held the caliper in place and then hung it from the frame with zip ties. Now the disk could be just pulled off. Pretty soon I found the problem. I saw that the actuating lever had slipped off the other shoe and actually didn't spread them at all. A few minutes with a screwdriver fixed it. I couldn't find anything else wrong so I put everything back together.

Naturally I needed to tune the brake shoes and the cable again but after those took a short test drive. The brake felt much better already but perhaps I'll check the passenger side too later...

Winter Time Blues

It's been a long time since my last update as nothing major has happened with the car. Driving season is already over so it's time to start planning for winter and recollect what happened during summer.

I drove only about 500 km (310 miles) with the Corvette but found some small problems during those trips. The interior is pretty noisy, it gets quite hot inside after the engine has warmed up and the coolant temperature rises if driving over 90 km/h (55 mph) for long periods. The first two annoyances should be fixed by adding more insulation to the interior but the last one could be a bit tricky. The problem is, I'm not absolutely certain, that the engine really starts overheating because the temperature sensor is right next to the exhaust manifold. It could just be heating the sensor at higher RPMs. I think I'll just add some heat wrap over the manifold before examining the problem further.

Another problem surfaced when I took the car for annual vehicle inspection. My Corvette didn't pass because the emergency brake didn't work properly. No matter how much I tried tuning it, I could not get it to hold. In the end I gave up and decided to check the brake during winter.

Those problems should keep me entertained for a while.