Confuzed1

iTrader: (4)

Not sure if this is the right place for this, but I'll ask anyway...

Long story short, I stupidly had my car painted with two broken door mirrors on it. Originally, they were both power mirrors.

Anyways, I just got done taking the internals out of a power DS door mirror I bought over the weekend, and putting it's internals (motor, glass etc) into the housing that was painted with the rest of my car. Luckily I didn't break the trunnion or anything and it's nice and tight and works great now.

Now for the PS - I only have a "Fixed" mirror I got off another car, and I'm hoping to take it's internals out and use it in my other freshly painted housing (that used to be a power mirror). I don't really care if the PS is power like it used to be or not. The problem is, I didn't realize that "fixed" mirror on these cars is not the same as a manual mirror - This sucker doesn't adjust at all!! I'm guessing there's no trunnion at all in this one...

I can't tweak the mirror to one side to get at the mounting screws since it's - "fixed"...so can the mirror be pried out of the housing without breaking it?? Has anyone done this?

I figured I'd ask before I break something trying. Has someone done this before??

I'm also really hoping the mounting studs are in the same spot on the one I'm taking glass out of and putting into ....

camaronewbie

Yep - you're right - power and manual mirrors are different. But, I think the housing is the same. IIRC, I just always moved the mirror by hand on the pass side when I had manual mirrors (I've since switched to power).

Try the best you can to be as careful as possible and see what you can do, as I don't remember. In all honesty, unless you painted a candy paint, you might end up having to get another mirror housing painted to match - your painter should be able to do it easily and pretty cheap.

Confuzed1

iTrader: (4)

Thanks for the reply camaronewbie. The mirrors are the same color as the rest of the car - Dupont pepper metallic gray, so it's not candy but it's not a common off the shelf color either. But I may need to just fork over the $$ and get this blue manual one painted as a last resort.

I can move the cable controlled mirrors around enough to get at the housing mounting screws, but this one is a straight manaul - no cables....it's almost like this one is solidly mounted in the housing - it doesn't move even 1/8".

I'm going to take a closer look today to see if I can tell where the mounting points are for this manual one. I'd hate to destroy the thing taking it apart....

I'll post up what I find for future reference to others I guess.

EDIT: Well, I took a good look at it with better lighting...mounting is different inside the housing. Looks like I need to either get a cheap used power PS mirror from another car and transfer the motor/mirror - or get the manual one re-painted.

Glad I didn't try to pry the glass off this manual one and ruin it....looks like I have a couple of mirrors for sale.

Confuzed1

iTrader: (4)

Just to help anyone out that goes on this crazy venture....seems that mounting brackets inside the housing are not the same between years....I have 2 pass side power mirrors now, and they both have different mounting bracket points inside the housing. The mirror backing plates are different too. I'm beyond frustrated...I have to be setting a record for most money wasted on mirrors...

MNformula350

iTrader: (2)

The Other thing you could do, so as not to have to worry about matching the Paint, is just have a Pair of Mirrors painted a nice Satin Black?

Just a thought, Good Luck on your Mirror Adventures

84redta

iTrader: (34)

I think they changed late in the generation, maybe 90 or 91, or at least thats what classic industries uses as a cut off on thier power mirrors. I did the motor swap with manual mirrors on my GTA, but can't remember how I did it. I know the screws were seized and it was a pain but it was doable by pulling down the manual mirror.

Confuzed1

iTrader: (4)

Actually, I had a set of gloss black ones on it I found locally...the DS was a remote cable and the PS was a fixed mirror. I just didn't like how it looked.

Now I have my original DS power mirror installed and working perfect, and was so positive the PS would be just as easy since I finally found a PS power mirror off another car (amazingly hard to find) ....so I was swapping the guts out of it into my original painted '83 housing and found out that they're different.

My new plan should work...I found my old power motor and wires and reinstalled them, and just bought a new convex mirror glass off EBAY - from the UK!! So I just need to bust off the rest of the broken glass off my old backing plate and install the new glass and HOPEFULLY this nightmare will be over!