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Lancia Delta Integrale specialists and enthusiasts
More window probs
This nice Evo1 is not in use at present, it's locked away keeping warm and dry. I did have to move it the other day, to fix a window in another car.
I lowered the passenger window in the red car, it stuck! The glass stopped dead and wouldn't move up or down, hmmm, let's have a look.
A door
So, I removed the handles and door card as shown previously, and had a look inside. I know that there's a strengthening beam across the inside of the door skin, this is U shaped with the U ends pointing towards inside the door. This leaves the exposed metal beam edge ready to catch the window glass support rail.
This glass support is also a U shaped structure, the two Us pointing their open jaws at each other, ready to lock jaws in battle.
The horizontal window glass support, show to the right here, is exposed to water running down the glass. This causes rust and the metal support swells up, then this catches on the also horizontal door bar, which jams the whole thing up.
I thought that had happened here, but no, the original metal window support had been replaced with an aluminium aftermarket substitute.
Aluminium isn't as strong as steel, so has to be made thicker to have the same strength, so the fine and delicate Italian window support had been replaced with a heavier, square section aluminium channel. This, with it's rubber insert, is wider than the original support, so is bound to catch on the door bar, which is what had happened here.
New original style window supports are no longer available, so we'll have to make the best of this one.
The only way to free the window is to pry it
with a good flat bar.
Pry the window down to free the locked rails, then operate the window down. This will expose the glass support rail and you can see what the problem is.
This is the aftermarket window support. I've had to put it back in place because I don't have any other type to use.
So I put the flat part in the vice, and bent it away from the door rail direction a bit. I tightened up the screws on this unit too. This did work, and the window operates freely now. But I'm not really happy with this, I think all the windows on this car might have had the rails replaced, and the new rails are a big beefy substitute for the delicate genuine part.
Anyway, I checked inside the door bottom for Waxoyle, the previous owner had flopped some in, then I replaced the door furniture, and all was as before.
These two window incidents happened on the same day! Both caused by different problems, I was lucky this occurred at our home garage. I was once leaving Heathrow airport multi storey parking in an Evo1, at the toll booth the passenger window jammed half way, the coin slot is on that side of course. I had to back up, take the handles and door card off right there, to free the window and get out of Heathrow. I wasn't popular with my family, or the other motorists!