95 Legacy - Power Window won't roll up/grinding

[jcmcclelland]

The drivers side power window has problems getting all the way up. It grinds too making a god awful noise.

 

Does this just sound like the problem of something being loose?

 

thx..jess

[ninjaben43]

autopsy time. and i would take care of it soon, i imagine the grinding will increase untill it destroys itself. its not hard to remove the door panels, so take a peek. oh and use a flashlight.

[gbhrps]

As suggested, pull the door panel and take a look. You could have anything from a loose track that the glass slides in, to a broken attachment point of the glass to its scissor mechanism, to sand and grit in the glass track binding the glass movement, to gears that are over stressed on the motor and starting to strip. If you can't diagnose the problem yourself, take the car to a body shop that does glass repairs and let them find the problem. It may require nothing more than retightening a bolt that's come loose, to a used power window motor and scissor mechanism from a junkyard. Anyway, you'll save money having the door already apart for them, or perhaps you'll see what's required and be able to correct it yourself at no cost other than your time. Good Luck!

[Kilroy]

This sounds exactly like the window regulator that died on my RL. They used a plastic gear in it that broke quite easily and once it did it made an awful sound and I could only get the window up about 90% of the way. Take it apart and have a look, they are quite easy to replace yourself if it comes to that. You can usually find rebuilt regulators for 1/3 the price of a new one.

[ionic]

Sounds similar to a problem we had on the driver's side window of two of our Legacies, a 95 and a 96. The interior sheet metal of the door shell near one of the regulator bolts tore and the bolt slipped off, allowing the regulator to slide partially down into the door at an odd angle. In both cases I was able to bend the tear in the door shell back and use a washer and an extra nut (If I recall correctly) to resecure the regulator. It's not a really elegant fix and I'm not sure if it will last permanently, but it's held up for a couple years on both cars. I think the door shell design is weak at the bolt attachment point and it's just a faulty design detail since the metal is so thin at that point since it happened exactly the same way on both cars.

[jcmcclelland]

I took a look at it yesterday, and didn't see anything obviously wrong..but then again I wasn't sure what to look for.

 

I'll crack it open again and look at the regulator.

[dxrflyboy]

The interior sheet metal of the door shell near one of the regulator bolts tore and the bolt slipped off, allowing the regulator to slide partially down into the door at an odd angle. In both cases I was able to bend the tear in the door shell back and use a washer and an extra nut (If I recall correctly) to resecure the regulator. It's not a really elegant fix and I'm not sure if it will last permanently, but it's held up for a couple years on both cars. I think the door shell design is weak at the bolt attachment point and it's just a faulty design detail since the metal is so thin at that point since it happened exactly the same way on both cars.

Subaru uses a good steel sector gear type window regulator, but the mounting bolts do tend to work themselves loose and chew up the door metal around the mounting holes. If all the bolts fall out, the regulator drops down and can come apart. The good thing is that it isn't difficult to put back together if you find all the pieces inside the door. I put some Loctite 242 on the bolts when I put them in to keep them from backing out again. Subaru needs to do this at the factory.