Rear sliding window rehab?

[Canonman67]

I like a rear slider in my truck but don't want to spend a couple hundred buying a new one. I have one in the parts truck but it needs some help. The windows are stiff and don't slide that easily and I'm wondering if anyone here has taken one apart and cleaned it up to make it function better. Or if you know of any pages detailing how to do this. I'm going to pull it out and see what I can do regardless but I'm hoping to not "go where no one has gone before."

Thanks,

Lionel

[cep62]

clean out the tracks then lube with silicone it should work alot better.

[Ranchero50]

The channel is an oddball size and the felt dry rots. I spent a good bit of time trying to find a stock size channel felt without luck. Once winter kills off the weeds I plan on hitting up the salvage yards and seeing what else will work out of modern cars or trucks. The trouble is the aluminum extrusions on the ends of the slider are full length so you need a channel that will allow for that. I'm thinking about shortening mine and running normal window felt that would hold the glass.

[sargentrs]

I have a slider to go in mine that also needs refurb. Be sure and let us know how yours turn out, guys!

[Ranchero50]

So, 95` out and my back hurt so the oldest son and I went junk yarding. $20 and two hours of sweating will net you this... Long stuff is the front window track from '93 F series, four short lengths are from the bottom of Chevy work van doors.


F series on the left is 5/8" wide x 1/2" deep. The Chevy stuff is 5/8" wide by 5/8" deep which is the channel size for our sliders. I chose the Chevy stuff from the bottom and may use the Ford stuff for the top. My top felt is OK. Neither make is long enough to do one in one piece so I put the split in the middle (which also meant I didn't have to take the window apart to do the work).


Drain holes...


5/16" punched out in an oval form.


Because the Chevy stuff has to long lip I needed to trim it back and also notch it to fit around the upright for the outer window.


Finally I cut 1/4" off the bottom of all my aluminum bits and sanded a radius on each end with the belt sander and deburred them with the wire wheel.


Surprisingly it all fit together pretty well and hopefully it'll be quiet on the road. There's still @ 1/4" vertical movement but the seals all feel tight. Now I just need to figure out how to glue the aluminum to the glass. Looks like black weatherstrip was in there. The glue channel is less than 1/8" deep.

[sargentrs]

Great work and thanks for the write up, Jamie!