I have a '79 Corvette L82 4speed that I purchased 3 years ago from the second owner. Except for one professional respray, the car was totally original but as is commonplace, was not driven on a regular basis so it had to be gone through to get everything functioning once again. 99% of issues were from lack of use and being parked for long periods of time. Which leads me to my reason for this post. It is a non air conditioned car and has manual windows and and locks. My issue is with the passenger door window and how stiff the window crank is. The driver's window is fine and cranks smoothly and freely. Over a year ago I took the passenger door panel off and first ran PB Blaser through all the tracks and rollers to free them up. As I kept lubricating more and more moving parts the system started to free up. I followed up with standard thin viscosity oil from an aerosol can with a thin tube, lubricating every track and roller that I had treated to PB Blaster. By the time I put the door panel back on and cleaned the oil of the glass, the window moved freely up and down as well as the driver's side. My issue is however, within two or three months it started getting harder and harder to crank again. Now over a year later I have to put so much pressure on the window crank it feels as if it might break off. Bummer that after all that effort it's as bad as it ever was.

Has anyone else had this issue, or f not, any suggestions? I was thinking that maybe the window crank gear mechanism may have some issues inside and it's NOT the window and track resistance. Before I waste another two hours I'd like to figure out how to do it right.

79 L82 4speed





Thanks in advance

 

Hopefully a moderator will move this to the C3 General forum.

Regardless, C2 and C3 window tracks operate the same way and require the same maintenance. Sounds like you used WD40 as a lubricant. WD is not a lubricant, it's a light kerosene, behaving more like a solvent that evaporates. After cleaning the tracks and rollers with WD, follow that up with high-quality grease – for my '72 tracks I used chassis grease. If chassis grease is not to your liking use something like Fluid Film or white lithium.

 

Thanks for the response. I actually followed up with bar and chain oil in a an aerosol can with the thin red tube. I chose that because it theoretically sticks to motorcycle chains and chainsaw chains. Not a lot of room to get chassis grease in the tracks.

 

Nice looking car, that's a beauty! Came close to buying a '75 once but didn't.

As 67:72 noted, you'll likely find other C-3 owners who have been down the same road in this section https://www.corvetteforum.com/forums/c3-general-119/ ,

 

To do the job, it would be best to remove the door panel and then the lower access panel. There are 4 different tracks and rollers/sliders to lube. Use a long stiff artist's or solder acid brush to reach the tracks and rollers. Be aware that after 50 years of use the rollers and their axles get really sloppy and damaged which can create binding.

 

As you're probably finding out, sometimes the simplest problem leads you down the rabbit hole. So you take the door panel off, now you're in there. The actual parts are not a ton of money. Might be worth your while to replace the little rollers and be done with it. ZIP Corvette should have them and probably other vendors as well. Looks like you're in CT so the car is probably hibernating anyway. By spring you can be done with it and cross that issue off the list.

 

Yes, this is already on my list but since I do have a good garage I take the car out for an hour every weekend if there is no snow or rain on the ground or in the forecast and don't put my vehicles up on blocks, change all the fluids etc. while they sit. (I do that with my motorcycle)

When I was in there the first time every thing looked fine with no noticeable wear other than everything was dry as a bone. Funny thing is, even though the car it a half century old, the driver's side window works fine because it was always used by default. Think I'll try once more using suspension grease, that will probably do the trick. I hope it's not in the winding mechanism the handle clips onto, that doesn't look like it would be a fun job to replace.

Unrelated, I always hear people talking about the late 70s C3s being dogs. While the weren't particularly fast, since I bought mine I completely desmogged it, had true dual exhausts with Dynomax mufflers installed, replaced all the ignition parts and had the Rochester carb rebuilt. The car is plenty fast enough for me, especially with the 4 speed. If I nail it in first gear both tires break loose and it gets rubber in 2nd and 3rd gear (on a track of course!) with 4th gear pulling all the way down to 2000 rpm with no problem. The L82 has 4 bolt mains and a mild cam from the factory and I'm thinking it's underrated by the factory like the LS6 big blocks etc. I read that the L82 was the only high performance small block made in that era and with the 4 bolt mains etc. it was popular with hot rodders. I've had a '70 4 speed /350/300, a '73 4 speed / w Targetmaster, a '78 4speed L48 25th anniversary but this car feels way faster than all of those. It may be due to the fact that it is very low mileage and was never raced or molested....

 

L-82 is the right engine....Had one in my 74 ragtop

 

Very beautiful car. As mentioned above, take the mechanism apart and change the rollers etc. They are available and inexpensive from the major Corvette vendors. Do not use white lithium grease. In a short period of time, it will harden and cause the symptoms you are currently experiencing. Use a good quality synthetic grease. Lastly, check out the C-3 side of this forum for specific information about your car. Jerry

 

Moved to C3

 

77 here, manual windows. I've always used the spray type white lithium grease. And no, I've never had an issue of any kind.
have relubed them probably twice in the last 30 years.

 

I had the same problem...after a year the glass was very hard to raise and lower.
The rollers were seizing on the axles.
The weather strip was hard brittle and "grabbing" the glass.

Be SURE to mark where all the adjsting bolts are BEFORE removing any mechanisms or guides...
or you;ll really have problems when you reinstall the new parts.
(It's probably NOT the gear mechanism unless it just needs some grease worked into the moving parts)

 

"Regardless, C2 and C3 window tracks operate the same way and require the same maintenance. Sounds like you used WD40 as a lubricant. WD is not a lubricant, it's a light kerosene, behaving more like a solvent that evaporates. After cleaning the tracks and rollers with WD, follow that up with high-quality grease – for my '72 tracks I used chassis grease. If chassis grease is not to your liking use something like Fluid Film or white lithium.
__________________
– Owen"

Well today I spent almost two hours coating all of the tracks/ rollers/ friction points etc. with spray lithium white grease. COVERED everything. As I was moving from one possible problem to the next things were not improving. (The door handle spline stripped during the process so I have a vice grip handle now). No matter what I hosed down with the grease there was only very minimal improvement. Then I noticed that the main center connection point of the scissors like window lift looked very dry so I drenched it. Everything freed up instantly and I thought I was done. However, as I rolled the window up and down over and over it slowly began to stiffen up again, almost the same as before I started. So now I'm totally confused. Are the rollers in the tracks supposed to turn like wheels? I been working on cars my entire life but I never got into the window mechanisms. I took the bottom inspection cover off but it didn't seem to offer much if any more clearance. I still have a sneaking suspicion that the window crank mechanism that the handle splines onto is binding inside but there is no way to lubricate the inside of the unit. Why every thing freed up and within 20 seconds and then everything froze again is hard to understand. The first time I hit everything with PB Blaster the window worked fine but in a few days it was stuck again. This is the last thing I thought I'd be wasting time on.

 

After many years, grease can thicken as the more aromatic hydrocarbons basically evaporate. Also, on my 70 what appears to have been white lithium grease simply hardens. In fact it's difficult to scrape off....forget about lubrication qualities. I removed all of the tracks from my 70, They were buried in deep globs of gooey black and hardened white grease...in addition to 50+ years of accumulated dirt. I bought a plastic storage container, filled it full of about 5 inches of water and dumped in a couple of cans of white powdered lye; i.e. sodium hydroxide. After soaking for about 2 days, the tracks were amazing to look at. All the grease was gone and there was no rust to be seen. All of the tracks looked factory fresh! BTW, sodium hydroxide NaOH, turns grease to soap. Removing the tracks involves removing the window. It looks very difficult, but it's not too bad. There's a lot of great Youtube videos to watch. For as old as your car is, cleaning up the tracks properly is one thing that needs to be done, some time or the other. I'm "doing" the windows in my 70.


Here's what I think is the best one. Here it shows putting the window tracks all back in. Take'n 'em out is basically the same as putting 'em back in, except in reverse sequence. This video has been a great help to me.