Car: 2003 Toyota Corolla CE
Recently, I had the joy of my window falling off the rail on the driver's side. Great fun trying to get through the Tim Horton's drive through
I took some pictures as I went through it in case anyone needs to do the same - I like these forums, and found some information on how to attempt this, but there have been a fgew questions about the C-Ring in particular, so thought I'd give back to the board.
Step 1: Popped off the armrest pieces (2) and unscrewed the screws holding the inside door panel on. See pic below.
Step 2: Now comes the worst part about this whole ordeal. I tried the cloth method of trying to get this C-Ring off, and ended up shredding one of the dish towels from the kitchen.
(love you honey!)
I think I may have moved the ring with all the messing around I did with the towle, but the way I got the ring off was I wrapped a shred of towel around the end of a screwdriver (biggest one I had) and stuck it under the window crank handle (between the handle and the door). This brought it out enough that I could see the ring, and I used a very thin knife (a tiny screwdriver might work too) and pushed/bent it into the end of the ring sticking out, and pulled it out. Needlenose pliers m,ay work here also, but space is quite limited, they'd need to be tiiiiny. Now, that being said, it was frustrating, but worth the looks of the neighbors as I danced around the yard waving the tiny C-Ring in the air. WOOT!
Now, why is this ring so darned important - hard to get out? Here's what the handle looks like installed. The arrows show where the ring sits inside, and how it holds the handle crank onto the post in the door.
Ugh.
Step 3: I then removed the door panel by sharp, quick pulls around the edge to dislodge the snap-in fasteners. You don't need to rip these things out, they're not in there that well, but a sharp, firm tug will do it. Watch for falling pieces.
Step 4: To get to the window bolts, you need to remove this panel:
There was some plastic covering this, and there was no other way I could see to get at it without cutting it. I made a nice (well, not really) cut into the plastic, and then when I was done, I used wide packing tape (duct tape would work too ... nobody sees it)
to stitch the two sides of the cut back together.
Under that is the rear bolt for the window, and the front one is near the front of the door. I've also shown the entire door shot, where you can see both pointed to by arrows.
Once you get the rear "service" panel off, it will look like this ...
The front bolt is hidden under here:
Those two bolts are the ones that hold the window onto the mechanism that lifts it up and down. They're bolted in place, as you can see in the pics.
My trouble was the rear one had vibrated out, and the window kept falling forward. D'oh!
Anyways. That's it. Installation is just the reverse.
NOTE: When you put the inside door panel back on (the large plastic covering) - make sure you place/slide it into the top first (where the window goes into the door) and then gently bump the fasteners into place around the door. I think I may have broke off a piece the first time I tried this accidentally, not paying attention to this matter.
Oh well. Happy fixing folks. Like I said at the top this is for a 2003 Corolla CE, but may apply to other years also.
Window Fix - Door Panel Removal
Linear Mode
