Technical Folding door mirror just fell apart in my hands

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Technical Folding door mirror just fell apart in my hands

jrkitching

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Morning all.

Yesterday I parked Maybelline and folded in the door mirrors, just as I've done every time I park in a place where some passing idiot might knock them. The difference this time was that the mirror just came apart in my hands. No warning, no indication that anything was amiss - just a separation of the housing into its constituent parts, leaving the mirror dangling on a wire.

Now I do fold the mirrors on a pretty regular basis, but I'll stress at this point that I'm very careful how I do this, and always use both hands. So I'll confess to being somewhat surprised by what happened.

I've now dug a little deeper and can tell you there is a design fault in the housing which means this will eventually happen to all 500's, if you fold the mirrors ofter enough. It doesn't matter how careful you are, and you won't get any warning - one day, the mirror will just fold in & fall apart. It could happen to you the next time you fold in your mirror.

You might be forgiven for thinking someone might have previously knocked the mirror and weakened something, or that it had frozen up, or whatever. It's none of these things - it's just plain simple cr*p design :bang:

How do I know this? Well, I've completely dismantled the mirror & identified the cause of the problem.

The folding part of the housing is held against the fixed part by a bush, with a powerful spring providing the clamping force. Tabs on the end of the bush locate it in the fixed part of the housing, but each time you fold the mirror, these tabs rub away a little bit of the plastic. One day, it rubs away one bit of plastic too much & that powerful spring pushes the whole thing apart. Nothing is actually broken, but too much of the plastic has worn away to stop the bush from popping out when you fold the mirror.

The easy fix is to replace the whole door mirror, but this costs money. Quite a lot of it - anywhere from £65 for a dubious internet pattern part to (I'm admittedly guessing here) around £200 for a main dealer labour inclusive replacement.

The (much) harder fix is to repair it. Follow me in real time on this thread today as I attempt to do just that.
 
I've now dug a little deeper and can tell you there is a design fault in the housing which means this will eventually happen to all 500's, if you fold the mirrors ofter enough. It doesn't matter how careful you are, and you won't get any warning - one day, the mirror will just fold in & fall apart. It could happen to you the next time you fold in your mirror.

You might be forgiven for thinking someone might have previously knocked the mirror and weakened something, or that it had frozen up, or whatever. It's none of these things - it's just plain simple cr*p design :bang:

And it'll affect the GP, Punto Evo and 'new' Punto, having the same mirror assembly. I have always thought it feels a bit creaky when folding.
 
Chapter 1: The Dismantling

You need to strip down the broken mirror assembly to get the five parts shown in the photo.

Briefly, this means removing the lower mirror housing trim, unbolting the mirror assembly from the door, prising out the mirror glass, unclipping the painted or chromed housing, unscrewing the motor, unclipping the wiring from the motor and feeding the wiring out through the bush (the connector on the motor end is just small enough to make this possible).

I've deliberately omitted the finer points, because if you have any problems getting this far, you certainly won't be going any further.
 

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Chapter 2: The Fix (Part 1)

Start by putting the small plastic bush into the large housing - see photo. It only fits one way. Then tape together the two parts of the housing - it makes it much easier to handle.

Leaving out the spring, familiarise yourself with how the metal bush is fitted - it slides in freely through the splines, and then is rotated 1/8 of a turn to lock it. Easy without the spring; not so easy without. It's powerful & I'd say it's impossible to press it in & turn it with your hands with that spring in place.

There are cutouts in the bottom of the bush, which are no doubt used in the factory to assemble it, but they don't help much now. I struggled for a bit before coming up with a solution.

The saving feature is that the bush is tapered, and a piece of 22mm copper central heating pipe fits nicely into the bush - so if you clamp a bit of 22mm pipe in a vice, you can use it as a mandrel. I'm not in my workshop just now, so don't have a vice, but I managed to improvise one using some pipe & a pair of mole grips! So, holding the pipe fixed rigidly by any means at your disposal, place the bush on the pipe, the spring on the bush, the housing over the bush, press down, rotate clockwise 1/8 of a turn and the bush will click neatly into position. Knock out the pipe, taking great care not to damage the tabs on the plastic housing.

You've succeeded in putting the housing back together, but don't break open the champagne just yet. Remember the cause of this problem is wear on the plastic housing, which you haven't addressed yet - so your neatly reassembled handiwork will quickly fall to bits again if you fold it back a few times. (I've arrowed the worn bit of retaining plastic in the photos - you'll see just how inadequate this design is).

So we still need to find some way of locking that pesky bush into place more permanently.

Stay tuned...
 

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...Now I do fold the mirrors on a pretty regular basis, but I'll stress at this point that I'm very careful how I do this, and always use both hands. So I'll confess to being somewhat surprised by what happened...
Thanks JR for posting your findings. My OH religiously folds in her mirrors but on the one occasion when I parked her car I didn't and it was kicked off.
Seems that on the 500 it might be best not to fold in the door mirrors given the flawed design.
Do you plan to continue folding your mirrors in ?
 
My OH religiously folds in her mirrors but on the one occasion when I parked her car I didn't and it was kicked off.
Seems that on the 500 it might be best not to fold in the door mirrors given the flawed design.

Damned if you do, damned if you don't :bang:

Do you plan to continue folding your mirrors in ?

Depends what happens in Part 3 ;). I'm currently looking at cutting up some scrap ABS to fit into the spline grooves on the housing & solvent welding them in to lock the bush. If that bush can be properly secured, the fix will be permanent. Any other ideas for locking the bush, anyone??
 
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Now I need to go and edit my post in which I listed the crappy bits and said I don't blame the member who decided to sell her 500 and get into a 107....
 
Robin's post made me laugh. Just what I needed as the next part required some fiddly improvisation and I needed cheering up. But I've locked the bush ;).

The idea of making some tabs out of ABS didn't work. I spent a frustrating couple of hours cutting up Lego bricks, to no avail.

So I cannibalised a 22mm pipe fitting & made some tabs out of copper. Since I've only a kitchen table to work on here, & a pair of pliers for clamping, they ain't pretty - but they should do the job.

Once satisfied with the fit, I glued them into place with the best gap filling superglue I could find at the local hardware store. They seem firm enough, and I can fold the mirror repeatedly without it falling apart again.

As the spring rotates against the other end of the bush, I applied a little oil at that point to help keep things moving freely.

Now all that is needed is to put everything back together again.
 

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Robin's post made me laugh. Just what I needed as the next part required some fiddly improvisation and I needed cheering up.

The idea of making some tabs out of ABS didn't work. I spent a frustrating couple of hours cutting up Lego bricks, to no avail.

So I cannibalised a 22mm pipe fitting & made some tabs out of copper. Since I've only a kitchen table to work on here, & a pair of pliers for clamping, they ain't pretty - but they should do the job.

Once satisfied with the fit, I glued them into place with the best gap filling superglue I could find at the local hardware store. They seem firm enough, and I can fold the mirror repeatedly without it falling apart again.

As the spring rotates against the other end of the bush, I applied a little oil to help keep things moving freely.

Now all that is needed is to put everything back together again.
If I was still living in Windsor I would definitely visit you to repair it!
 
Chapter 4: Reassembly

"Reassembly is the reverse of dismantling".

How often have you read that? And how often have you found that, er, no, things ain't that simple.

So I'll give you the complete rundown & highlight the gotchas.

Start by threading the door mirror wiring up through the bush. Press the foam plug into the bush, leaving the end close to the end of the bush in order to protect the cable.

Now thread the motor connector back into the housing, and connect it to the motor. It's handed, so you can't fit it the wrong way round, but do make sure you clip it fully home.

Before screwing the motor into position, turn the housing over & catch the cable in the retainer - this isn't so easy once the motor is in place.

Position the motor carefully, ensuring there's no stress on the cables or connectors, and replace the three screws. Note that these are self tapping screws into very flimsy plastic, so be very careful not to cross thread or overtighten.

Pull the wires for the mirror heater back into the body of the housing, and you are done with this part.

I suggest you now go and refit it to the car - that way, you can check everything works properly before refitting the mirror glass & trim.

Reconnect the wiring, make sure you've pulled any loose cable into the base of the housing (otherwise it might catch when you lower the window). Hook the top clip into the door & replace the bolts.

You should now be able to fold the mirror in repeatedly without it falling to bits. The folding process does feel more secure than it did before the modification to properly secure the bush, so hopefully it will prove to be durable in service.

Check the electric mirror adjusters work correctly, and check the window moves smoothly. When you are satisfied that all is as it should be, refit the cover, the bottom trim and the mirror glass.

A final word of caution - the connectors to the heated glass are very flimsy, so be extra careful when removing and replacing them.
 

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Well, the job is done & all is well again :).

The Final Chapter: Summary & Conclusions

The 500 door mirror is badly designed and is almost certain to fail if regularly folded. If it does, the mirror & housing will be danging by a wire, making it hard to drive away without causing further damage. You can't disconnect the wire without removing the mirror from the door, so all 500 owners who fold their mirrors might consider carrying a 5mm allen key to unbolt it (easy) if it happens away from home. At a pinch, you could probably get home by taping the two bits of the housing together, so you could carry a roll of masking tape instead.

It can be repaired, but the repair is fiddly & involves cutting some custom-designed locking tabs. I can't see any garage wanting to take this on, so repair is probably a DIY-only solution. Once repaired this way, it should be better than new. The repair feels more solid that the original design (OEM 500 mirrors feel as if they're about to fall apart when you fold them, even when new). The alternative is a replacement mirror; anywhere from £65 upwards but very easily fitted so labour charges should be low if you really can't manage it yourself.

If you're reasonably handy & are a regular mirror folder, you could follow this thread & fit the locking tabs as a precaution before it fails. You can do this before it breaks with the mirror on the car, and you don't have to dismantle anything. Just take off the lower housing trim panel (the one that covers the bolts), and you can put the tabs in from underneath. Otherwise, I'd suggest you restrict folding the mirrors to situations when it's really necessary in order to prolong their life. If it does fail, it will do so completely and without any warning.

I'd also caution against buying secondhand mirrors, unless you're going to reinforce them in the manner described here.

This isn't so much penny-pinching as sheer bad design - it wouldn't have cost FIAT any more to have designed this in a way that wasn't doomed to failure :mad::bang::bang:.
 
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This isn't so much penny-pinching as sheer bad design - it wouldn't have cost FIAT any more to have designed this in a way that wasn't doomed to failure :mad::bang::bang:.

But then they wouldn't sell any replacement mirrors a few years down the line.

As I've said before, FIAT don't have exclusivity on bad design, at least it's 'just' the mirror housing; Google VAG 2.0TDI oil pump/balancer shaft drive chain failure and you'll see what I mean :)

Nice fix, good to see someone repair, rather than replace.
 
ePer does list a power fold mirror for some markets for the 500, so I suspect the 4Cs ones will be the same.

Does that mean they'd be available from UK suppliers? Any idea if the wiring is already there for hook up?
 
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