I have had two of my windows get to a point of non working. Doing a little troubleshooting I found that they were still pulling current and suspected that something was seized up. I removed the unit and removed the motors from the regulator assembly.
Both would run (barely with some help) while removed from the rest of the regulator. Not the best thing to do since the way they are mounted into the rest of the assembly provides the support for the output end of the motor.

With a bit of force, I was able to remove the armature assembly and found the major cause of my problem. The far end of the motor is supported by a brass bushing which had seized to the motor shaft. When the motor did run, the bushing was spinning in the housing. A little bit of cleaning and the problem is fixed.

Only one probelm, I had to force the bushing out of the housing, forcing a retaining washer out of shape to get it out. I reassembled the motor by opening up the retaining washers tabs enough to allow the bushing to be reinstalled. Using a brass punch, I forced the retaining washer's tabs back in place the best I could.

After reassembling the total assembly, lubricating its gears and reinstalling it in the door, it works, but not as well as I would like.

The inability to remove the bushing without damaging the motor is a design weakness in the motor assembly. It would not have cost that much more to design the motor with a back cap so that it could be easily repaired.

Has anyone else gotten this deep into working on the unit and if so have you come up with a better way to work on the bushing?
Does anyone know of a way to remove the retaining washer without destroying it or better yet know where to get replacement washers? They do not look all that special.

I am tempted to remove the two remaining window motors and remove the armatures before the motor shaft seizes to the bushing and cleaning and lubricating the motor properly and without causing any damage to it.

Wayne
82 300SD
98 ML320