Hey guys,

Have a bit of a mystery on my hands here. Maybe you guys can help. Lo and behold I come to the garage one morning and see that the left rear window had dropped. I opened up the door panel and saw that the wire which moves the window up and down was all tangled and snarled. So I'll be replacing the rail unit with a new one. I know for sure that the window motor works because when the damaged wire was still attached I could hear the gears inside the unit turning. Now.... the same thing has happened to my right front passenger side seat. I haven't opened up the door panel yet to see if the problem is in the motor or the rail/cable similar to the rear window. I have noticed tho that when I hold the switch down to lower the window there is absolutely no effort being made at all or any noise coming which indicates that the motor is trying to lower the window. Atleast when the rear window was damaged I could still here the motor trying to lower the window.

Do you guys think that the motor has failed or is the rail/cable the part that has failed? Just trying to save some time by not having to open up the door to have a look. Any thoughts? Thanks in advance guys! Hope you have a terrific weekend!

Cheers

It is not unusual to have both rear regulators fail near the same time- happened to me. On a plus note on purchase on E-bay will get you both regulators and you will already have the tools out- so replacing the second regulator is not such a big deal. Doesn't matter much of the motor or cable failed unless you are going to fix the cable yourself- but at $104 in shipping for a SET of replacement regulators- hard to justify the cable repair for many.

On the topic of regulators, would it be good preventative maintenance to use a little plastic epoxy weld to reinforce where the cable attaches to plastic parts?

Best bet would be to search on Archon and regulator. He came up with a great fix that is cheap, easy and repeatable.

I plan to do the new Regal windows before buttoning up the doors as precautionary.

thanks guys. i think i'm gunna go ahead and order a regulator for the left-rear and the right-front. i was looking at the rockauto parts catalog and noticed that they have 2 brands. one is by Dorman and the other by AC Delco. I'm steering clear of Delco because I'll prolly run into the same crap problem again yes? Has anyone used the Dorman replacement regulators? They seem to be an ok price since they come with the motors. Any other brands I should consider? Thanks again.

On another note... has there ever been a recall for this problem? Seems like LOTS of ppl have been complaining about this....

Sawgunner and I have both used the cheap $104 pair from Ebay and have had zero problems with them. You get two cheaper than one at RockAuto.

The company I bought the regulator pair from was am-autoparts.com , item number WRG-00261 and ERG-00260, total including free shipping was 101.95.

I suggest keeping the motor(*) because I had one go bad. The prevailing problem is that the white plastic piece that holds the cable end cracks and allows the cable to pop out. Then the window falls. Most people upon seeing that will try to roll the window up. And that'* when that free cable end just bumps against something and comes off the spool at the bottom... instant bird'* nest.

GM will sell you the whole thing for north of $300 but as others have pointed out, there are cheaper alternatives.

Regards,

Greg B.

Good thread, good advice. Both my back windows went out 2 years ago (cable popped off the plastic part and the cable chewed up). Faced with the $300 option per door (until now) I opted to hold the windows in place by screwing a household window lock on the regulator rail. Sounds like a plan if both windows can be done for $100-ish.