Nearly inoperable window

I replaced the inner/outer scrapers and felt channel on the driver's
door of my 1969 standard Beetle. The
inner scraper was a cheap nightmare on which the clips broke if you
looked at them wrong. Almost as cheap
were the $1.75 felt channel clips. I'm glad I bought twice as many as
I needed. I put everything back
together, and now the window is so hard to operate that I fear
breaking the regulator (already broke my
new crank). I've already tried shifting the window around, and it
raises as straight as it ever will.
The felt channel was off-spec (wider profile than original), but I
don't think that's the reason, as I widened the channel
as much as I could with plastic putty knife after installation. Maybe
the new rubber on the scrapers is creating a problem. I was ready to
leave the inner scraper out totally :-(. Any suggestions besides the
usual silicone spray?
I've searched this group and not found a problem quite like mine.

On 22 May 2007 13:22:03 -0700, JM > wrote:

>I replaced the inner/outer scrapers and felt channel on the driver's
>door of my 1969 standard Beetle. The
>inner scraper was a cheap nightmare on which the clips broke if you
>looked at them wrong. Almost as cheap
>were the $1.75 felt channel clips. I'm glad I bought twice as many as
>I needed. I put everything back
>together, and now the window is so hard to operate that I fear
>breaking the regulator (already broke my
>new crank). I've already tried shifting the window around, and it
>raises as straight as it ever will.
>The felt channel was off-spec (wider profile than original), but I
>don't think that's the reason, as I widened the channel
>as much as I could with plastic putty knife after installation. Maybe
>the new rubber on the scrapers is creating a problem. I was ready to
>leave the inner scraper out totally :-(. Any suggestions besides the
>usual silicone spray?
>I've searched this group and not found a problem quite like mine.

Did you take the regulator apart to clean and regrease it? That made a
huge difference. With the old scrapers (read: nonexistent) the regulators
took a bath each time it rained so they were rather rusty and dirty. After
I carefully pried the crimped metal on the end of the regulator open so I
could remove the "gears" (more like a fuzzy spring) I was able to clean
and regrease both my regulators so they work *great*. It was still a
bitch getting the scrapers in properly though. Glad that's over with.
--
Michael Cecil
http://home.roadrunner.com/~macecil/
http://home.roadrunner.com/~safehex/
http://home.roadrunner.com/~macecil/hackingvista/