DasBoot

I finally found it! After months of looking there it was.. a 1984 300SD, 74k original owner miles, documented from the dealer deposit to every diesel price for every tank of fuel since new . It was checked out by a MB mechanic who wanted to buy it as it's condition matched it's milage. I'm loving the car.

..So last Friday I load up the family for a weekend away, and am quite excited about he prospect of a road trip in this giant sedan . A 1/2 mile from the house my 3 year old asked to have his window put up.. and it doesn't work. We take a U turn and unload the MB and load up the Volvo wagon with resolve to tackle the problem this week. BTW the fishing was great last weekend.
I'm mechanically inclined enough to be dangerous due to a volitale relationship I had with a Fiat in college, and tackled the problem today.
The window motor is working, so I deduce that somehow things aren't connected inside the door. Thanks to this web site and a #6 philips screwdriver I had the door panel off in minutes. I carefully pulled up the vapor barrier (what is the best way to reseal the vapor barrier? Rubber Cement? Duct Tape to the door, making sure if accessed again to peel the tape from the metal?) and see that the mechanical arm that attaches to the window is unhooked.. AND inside a greased up channel attached to the bottom of the window is a broken plastic fitting (widget?) that needs replacement (yes, an obvous correlation).
I head down to the local MB parts store and pick up a new bracket for $5.00.
At this point I'm quite pleased with myself at my thriftiness and my mechanical fortitude.
Then reality hits me
Inside the new plastic bracket I just bought is this neat little solid steel rivet.
Attached to the mechanical arm for the window is the old solid steel rivet still clinched.
Now what?
Can I do this operation leaving the components inside the door?
Can the mechanical arm be easily removed to be worked on?
It looks like a hack saw can take the rivet off.
However, placing the new bracket on could be difficult as the plastic housing must remain on while clinching the fastener on to the mechanical arm.
So I come to you, wise MB fourm members dispensing your mechanical knowledge from the mountain.
Is there an easy fix?
Please don't advise to open wallet, invert, and shake.
Thanks in advance for your help!
Cheers,
Mike

Hattaresguy

I did this on my SDL, you need to pull the entire assembly out of the door and drill out the old rivet. Than it is just a matter of banging the new rivet's head over once it is threw the hole.

Good luck with the new car!

300SDTURBOS

DasBoot/All:

No banging required.

I've had two very typical window regulator jaw slider failures in a month on a 1983 and 1984 300SD --- in this case, both were rear driver's side window.

The nylon sliders with steel pin (~$4.29 ea fm importec.com) are supposed to be inserted into regulator arm and narrow end of pin mushroomed to stay in regulator arm hole. This generally requires removing the regulator mechanism from the door.

After removing the door panel and then removing the old slider (generally nylon portion is shattered) and then removing the old pin from the regulator arm...

...I took a different approach and elected to gently disassemble the new nylon slider (it clips together enclosing the retaining the pin) and used a 1/4 inch 20 die to cut threads into the narrow diameter of the pin and then reassembled the slider and pin.

(You can also use an appropriate metric die if you have an appropriately sized metric nut laying around. I assume a finer pitch thread would be better than the relatively course 20 I used but I had tons of 1/4 inch 20 nuts available)

I then slid the slider into the lubed regulator channel and attached it to the regulator arm with a 1/4 inch 20 nut (very common size around the garage...) with Locktite (as added insurance) to secure it to the regulator arm.

This approach avoids the trouble of removing the window regulator from the door to mushroom the pin in the regulator arm.

Hope this helps someone do an easy repair on those trouble prone 300SD window sliders...

DRG

560300

After removing the window regulator, I grind the back side of the rivet, which releases the rivet. Then place the new slider in the hole. Place a section of steel rod the size of the inner hole (available at any Home Depot, could use a socket) in the plastic slider. Use the rod as a mandrel and mushroom the rivet and reassemble.

My understanding is Mercedes made this piece plastic as a safety mechanism, it is supposed to fail in case someone were to be caught by the window.