V36 Folding mirror fault

[nicko370]

Hi all. 

Have been searching for info on an intermittent fault whereby drivers side mirror has stopped working intermittently .. passengers side functions as normal but the drivers has become very much hit and miss. 

 

Any ideas? I suspect it's a loose connection, does the  door trim need to come off to access mirror connections, or just the small speaker trim as i suspect. If so what is the best technique for prying loose. Tips please I don't want to break anything.

Also can this function be turned off? I've read about a toggle switch for this but mine does not appear to have one. 

[V35_Paul]

Try a search on youtube for a DIY repair / replacement. should be able to get a video showing you how

[nicko370]

Cheers Paul.  Got a bit of an idea thanks to good ol you tube.. my main concern was not wrecking anything in the process.. even so, half the plastic door clips stayed behind in their sockets when removing the door trim, as expected. Nothing a few new clips won't fix. .. next time

Ultimately the diagnosis proved to be dodgy contacts between board and motor... extremely fiddly not to mention frustrating to work on.  Note to others attempting this..mirror glass just pops out as you would expect but do try and get your fingers right in behind and as close to the plastic clips as possible...(heated mirror glass could be hard/ expensive to find) as it required a lot more force than I would have liked to apply!! Also reassembled with some grease to assist in future removal (I ended up doing this multiple times lol). 

Motor and gearbox are all enclosed in a cute little plastic housing, seemingly glued together in the factory.  Be careful not to damage the circuit board as mine insisted on coming out with all the glue residue as opposed to staying put where it belongs.

Motor is indeed a tiny 12 v hobby motor(read this on another thread somwhere) like you would find in a slot car. Unfortunately you cant entirely disassemble the mirror as the harness plug holds all the various components captive, so you have to work with everything dangling on a cord. Got  the motor running with some jiggling about on a test run, cleaned up the contacts, reassembled and put back together feeling very pleased with myself, only to plug it back in and nothing! Ended up with it apart multiple times (did I mention be careful not to damage circuit board?) and found myself having to resolder one of the tiny capacitor thingies back into position from some ham fisted handling courtecy of yours truly.

Not sure how, but got it all working on about the eighth attempt.. door trim back on and lo and behold no power door lock. Trim off again (one of the actuator cables had slipped our of its retainer) back together and all is right with the world. Voila..perfectly working folding mirror.  Total investment approximately 7 hours. 

Next morning guess what? Mirror stuck again 🤨..can hear it trying (which was more than last time) and got it to work with some coaxing, (maybe it was just tired from the late night) and one week later it's still going strong. I'm not holding high hopes but at least next time I'll know what I'm up for. 😁

[V35_Paul]

I feel sorry for ya. All that back and forth 😬

I would have tried a few times then paid someone else to do it 🤦‍♂️