I don't really do the oily bits these days, other than the dipstick, but £500 for a carcass assembly Vs £50 for the repair kit is a bit of an incentive to get in and have a go
Curiously the kit contains parts that do not apply, in that they are not present in my mirror but they are perhaps relevant to other BMW's, i don't know.So the problem was here.
These two gears operate at right angles to each other, one is somewhat worn!
Just these two gears are needed in the repair, the cast casing frankly is poor quality and as the original had no wear and fitted rather better, i elected to re-use it. The one shown is the new one.
These parts have no home in my mirrors,
So i reckon an hour tops for this job as long as you don't do what i did! It's tricky to explain but the 'stub' shown in my early picture once the mirror body is lifted off, has another casing inside released from the underside access panel. This in turn houses a spring loaded sprocket which i dropped, in doing so it separated before i could even get a visual on it let alone index mark it. It reassembles easily enough but in multi positions only one of which is right, but you have to basically fully reassemble before that is discovered >:(
For anyone accomplished this would be a breeze it's fiddly more than difficult. I am really happy to have two functioning mirrors again and i realise now the failure was waiting to happen as it had become jerky and noisy on the drivers door. For £50 spent and a couple of hours i am chuffed
Oh for Sanj.
No need to strip out the door interior, everything is easily accessed from the outside which i regard as a bonus
four screws are upside down but not hard to reach.
