I just brought home a Turbo drive train/power train swapped NA that sat for many years. Everything that moves is starting to not want to move. Including the windows...Driver side window is totally stuck.

Power windows. I looked at these for guidance:
https://www.rx7club.com/new-member-r...te-up-1112787/ and
https://fc3spro.com/TECH/HOWTO/PWREBUILD/pwrebuild.html

I now understand having the window around half way down would really help! However I can not get the window down at all. It won't budge. So I decided to unbolt the regulator and motor from the door and try to pull everything out all at once. No go, too tight. But I do see that tilting the glass forward and pulling the rear out first is the way to do it, if you can get the regulator to clear...

I can't seem to be able to reach the bolts that hold the glass on the regulator. Is there an easier way that I'm over looking? Is there a technique or a position to get the assembly in to make it easier to reach the glass mounting bolts?

 

you might try unbolting the motor from the regulator? there are the two holes in the door that will line up with the window when it its halfway down, but a box wrench can fudge that

 

The bolts holding the motor to the regulator might be easier to reach. Thanks for the idea!

 

does the motor make noise when you try to roll it down like a little clunk? the window may be glued to the seals, spray the window with glass cleaner liberally around the channels and seals, lightly wrap the glass with your fist, nudge it down by sandwiching your hands over it and push down a few times to see if the glass will move at all.

 

Down, it doesn't make any noise, but I can hear a noise from the motor when trying to go up... But this is still a good idea. The glass could very well be sealed to the...seals. I might try this first.

 

the window switches carry all the load, the switches likely need to be taken apart and cleaned. you can apply power and ground directly to the motor, switching polarity goes up or down.

it's quite common for fc window switches to burn the contacts internally.

 

Ok, that makes sense. I think I have a path forward. I was at a point last night where I was getting worried the glass would shatter in my face and knew it was time to take a step back.

1. Figure out if the glass is stuck to the upper seals - quite possible, I think the car has seen many heat/cool cycles sitting in a garage.
2. Try direct power to the motor.
3. Failing that unbolt the motor the from the regulator, pull the motor out, lower the glass down, unbolt the glass from the regulator and pull everything out.

Sounds like it it'll be worth taking the switches off the door panel and looking at the contacts inside too.

Good news is the DS door is the worse one. Passenger door window does go up and down, albeit slowly.

 

Got the window out after trying a few different things. Eventually got the whole assembly manipulated that I could get a wrench on the fasteners that hold the glass to the regulator while in the up position. Found some interesting things along the way: Possible contacts were not in the switch correctly, electric motor might be locked up etc.

Thanks for giving me some ideas! Continuing the refurb of the windows.

 

New problem! Got everything out of the door and applied direct power to the motor. Not movement whatsoever. Looking at the motor I see screws and circlips and decide "It already doesn't work, how much worse can it get if I take it apart?"

Inside the motor assembly is a plastic gear that the metal armature (not sure if that's correct term) spins via worm gear at opposite end of it. The plastic gear sits on a rubber spindle with a shaft through it to the outside of the assembly and another plastic impeller looking thing moves the beads. Side note, I was surprised but happy to see how clean and lubricated the beads and impeller thing were!

Inside this motor assembly it was rusted stuck. So badly it wouldn't move at first but I got it to rotate freely. Found another circlip on the bottom side so I'll try taking that off later.

Finally my question: is this even serviceable? I mean, it's at a point where I think if I reassembled everything, it should all move and the window will go up and down (for now) but how much effort should I put into restoring this or is this never going to work at all, and abandon all hope and go find a replacement on ebay or whatever?

 

I guess I should also mention, I have no idea "what good looks like" for this. I suppose I could take the pass side apart and compare, assuming it's in better condition. That might give me a reference point. It just seems like a lot of material has rusted/disintegrated.

 

hmm my last car had the exact same thing happen, water got in there and it wasn't supposed too.
i ended up replacing mine because i found one really easy and cheap.

if you could get that motor to work, you'd be fine i think

 

you can still find window regulators new, but you won't like the prices, they go for around $600 each. i'd just clean it and relubricate it as best you can and get it working, check periodically for second hand parts in good condition and hold those as a backup.

here is a link to the regulator gear, this is one typical wear item inside the regulator:

FB0558581 Genuine Mazda SPROCKET,REGULATOR GUIDE FB05-58-581 | eBay

when the gear is worn the issue is the regulator pops like a machine gun because the plastic gear strips out.

some other mazda cars from the era may share the same regulator parts like this one does. i have no clue which, my motors have never failed but this ball gear has.

 

This is making sense to me. Thanks folks. You're exactly right. As soon as I found the motor did not want to move with direct power I stopped and looked quickly at prices and did not like what I saw and decided to keep taking it apart.

Thanks so much for being a sounding board!

 

a little cleaning and fresh grease goes a long way to making an old tired window regulator working like new again. if the ball gear does look a bit worn though you might want to pick one of those up, they're not very expensive. the part number is FB05-58-581, usually around $15 with shipping, though some are reproductions.

 

After reading some posts and "how tos" to clean and regrease them, I was expecting it to be broken or jammed up. But it appears to be pretty good! Once I open up the passenger door and evaluate that window, I'll decide what I'm going to do with the ball gears...For now, I will carry on with trying to clean up the rust in this motor!

 

Mazda used to sell the regulator as one assembly with the motor,
at some point they split it up, which was fun, cause you'd order a regulator and then get a gear, and there was a WTF
FB05-59-560J for the left
FB05-58-560J for the right

anyways, the motors by themselves are
FB05-59-58X for the left
FB05-58-58X for the right

just the regulator by itself is
FB05-59-590B for the left
FB05-58-590B for the right

 

Finished cleaning it up this weekend, covered the with rust converter hoping to slow things down a bit. Covered it all with grease, reassembled and put everything back. Struggled getting the window back in the track again but once I figured it out, it goes up and down now like it should.

Thanks for everyone's input. I'll be keeping an eye out for some working used ones as a spare! Now that I know I can reliably get the window up and down I feel better about work on the rest of the car (I was worried about getting locked out while working on it).