How to Replace Front Power Window Regulator 2000-05 Mercury Sable

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Hi, I'm Mike Green. I'm one of the owners of 1A Auto. I want to help you save time and money repairing or maintaining your vehicle. I'm going to use my 20-plus years experience restoring and repairing cars and trucks like this to show you the correct way to install parts from 1AAuto.com. The right parts installed correctly: that's going to save you time and money. Thank you and enjoy the video.

In this video, we're going to show you how to replace a front window regulator on this 2002 Mercury Sable. It's the same as any 2000 to 2005 Sable, and very similar for the 2000 to 2007 Taurus. The tools you'll need include a Phillips screwdriver, door panel clip tool or a putty knife, ratchet and extension with 6mm, 8mm, 10mm, and 11mm sockets. I have a star next to that 10mm because that fit the size bolts that I used to put it back together. You may use bolts or you may have a rivet gun and decide to put it together that way. You'll also need a hammer and punch, drill with 5/16 and 1/2 inch drill bits to drill out the rivets that hold the regulator in, pliers or small wire cutters, and painters tape.

Use an 8mm wrench to disconnect my negative battery cable, and this helps protect your battery from running down while your doors are open.

To remove your door panel you're going to start by removing a series of screws. In the front there is one here, there are two down below, two right behind the door pull there, and then there's also two on the back. You're probably going to have to use a shorter screwdriver for this one on the front. I'll just hit fast-forward as I remove the rest of them. They are all Phillips screws. Now you want to use a door panel clip tool. If you don't have one of these, a household putty knife will do the same thing. Put it in behind, and you slide it down until you come to one of the clips, and then pry it out. There is going to be a clip up higher as well. They might come out pretty easy because it feels like it's probably been off before. The door panel clip tool you kind of use the same way, put it in behind until you come to one of the clips, then pull off. Once you have it loose pull it straight out. Pull it up off of your door lock and then off of your door handle here. Now just reach in behind; each one of these has a little tab you press and disconnect. Down under here the tab is on the backside, so I'm actually kind of pulling with my finger like that and pulling down. Once those are all unplugged your door panel comes off. The 6mm socket; I'm going to fast-forward here as I use a 6mm socket and ratchet to remove that speaker. In behind, you unplug it by pressing a tab and pulling. Now I'll pull the wire harness clips out of the door and pull your water shield back.

On this side you've got four rivets that hold the regulator to the door, and on this side you've got two bolts that hold it on there. For these rivets I'm going to use a punch and punch out the very center of the rivet. After it's punched it looks like that. I'll do all four. Now I'm using a 5/16 drill bit and I'm putting it right into the rivet and slowly drilling away the rivet. Here you can see the head of my rivet comes off, and it could be hot so be careful. Now I'll just repeat that for all four. Now I'm going to remove these two 11mm bolts over here. I'm going to speed it up here as I remove those two 11mm bolts.

You can see me, just for safety sake, hold the window with the other hand, just to make sure it doesn't drop down when I take those bolts out. Holding onto the window, you want to push your regulator out. Now your window will go down. Now what I've done is I've lifted the window up, or actually let it down a little bit, and supported it in this semi-open position. Now we can look right through here and we can see a rivet that holds the track to the window there, and a rivet that holds the track to the window right there. Now I'm going to repeat the process of punching out the middle of those rivets.

One tip here: if you have an assistant, hold the bottom of the window, it'll help keep it steady to punch out those rivets and then drill them. I do have an issue on this one where I can't punch out the rivet in the front, so I basically just use the drill and file it down as much as possible and then take it apart. You will want to use a larger drill bit, probably a 3/8 or 7/16. Once you have the rivets drilled out, you'll probably want to take the window out so you can get the remainder of the rivets out of the window. Pull off the trim on the back of the window opening, and then pull up the weather strip that's on the window ledge. Just move that out of your way, and then you can tilt the window forward and bring it up and out.

You can see I kind of mutilated this when I basically filed it down with the drill, so I've got to take some wire cutters and cut off some of the rivet so it'll go through. Then I can just come on this other side. First I'll finish pulling the middle of the rivet out, then grab hold of this and work it out. Then this one up here. These just go back in and snap together. Then we'll put the window back down in. Make sure you get the rear under the channel, pull the front up in, then you can pull it all the way up. Once you pull it up, use some painter's tape and just use a few strands to hold it in place. Now put the window seal weather strip back in place. Put the back down in first, then press the middle down, and then put the window trim back in place.

Here's the new regulator from 1AAuto. Really it's the same as the old one, the only difference is it does have a little pigtail for the connection. It's not that big of a deal. You can feed it right in, just like the other one came out. Get it in place and we'll use some M6 bolts, 10mm with a washer on them, and I'll put this first one into the regulator. It'll just be a little easier. I'm just reaching in here and putting it in this upper hole, bolt it in there. Take the regulator, there's a little slot here that comes through and holds it, add that little serrated nut to the other side, get that one started. I can reach through up here, I'll do this top one. That one's through.

Even though these are sticking through, they're not going to interfere with anything. Then I use a 10mm socket. Basically, I'm using nuts and bolts to replace the rivets. If you have a rivet gun and the correct size rivets, obviously you can put it together that way. I'm just speeding up here as I put the rest of the bolts and nuts in, and then tighten then up nice and firm with a socket and ratchet. Then re-position the arm of the regulator and put the other bracket in place, and bolt that in place with the 11mm bolts. Reconnect our window motor, just so I know it's up out the way I'm just going to pinch it right in here a little bit.

Okay, so now it's pretty wound up, you can see there are one of the holes for the window track and the other one. I'll slide the window down and hold it. You're going to want to use some longer, 2cm long bolts. What I'm doing here is feeding the bolt through the window first and then positioning the window and getting the bolt through the track. Then obviously repeat that for the rear mounting point. So I've got those bolts started in.

Here I'm using my socket with my extension, inserting a 10mm nut, and getting it on to the bolt that is through the window and the regulator. A tip here: if your regulator, when you put it in, does not line up perfectly with those access holes in the door, so you can always reconnect your window switch, reconnect your battery, and move the regulator a little bit to line it up better with the access holes. You want to tighten those up nice and firm. You might need a 10mm wrench as well or whatever size nut and bolt you might use.

Here with the battery could be reconnected, I reconnect my car window switch and just run a quick test. It looks like [inaudible 00:15:06] everything is working okay. I can start putting the door back together. We'll fast-forward through this. Make sure our connection is solid. Put the water shield back and bolt back in the speaker. Make sure you reconnect the speaker, then bolt it back in. Put the harness clips back into the door, and then just get the water shield all set and you can put your door panel back on.

Reinstall the door panel. You've got pins in certain places: two up top, there's a couple down here, I'm missing a couple because this has been apart before. You also have these two large line up pins. You want to put your door up, put your panel in place, and reconnect all your harnesses. The green one goes there, power to our mirror goes up here, and these two go into the power window switch. Now put your door handle through, and then slide the panel back, lift it up, get the door lock pushed through, and kind of peek in behind and line up those large line up tabs, both front and the back. Then make sure your pins are going in to the holes. Now put your screws back in. Start at the one at the front here. I'm just going to speed it up here as I put the rest of those screws in. When you tighten them, you want to tighten them nice and firm but you don't want to over tighten them.

Once you've done this reconnect your battery and you're all set.

We hope this video helps you out. Brought to you by www.1AAuto.com, your source for quality replacement parts and the best service on the Internet. Please feel free to call us toll-free, 888-844-3393. We're the company that's here for you on the Internet and in person.

How to Replace Front Power Window Regulator 2000-05 Mercury Sable

step 1 :Removing the Door Panel

step 2 :Removing the Window Regulator

step 3 :Removing the Rivets from the Window

step 4 :Installing the New Regulator

step 5 :Resetting the Motor

step 6 :Reinstalling the Door Panel

Tools needed

Shop Products

Ford Taurus Mercury Sable Front Driver Side Power Power Window Motor & Regulator Assembly TRQ WRA51369

Part Details:

How To Replace Manual Window Regulator 1980-96 Ford F-150 F-250 F-350

How to Replace Front Power Window Regulator 2000-05 Mercury Sable

step 1 :Removing the Door Panel 1:20

step 2 :Removing the Window Regulator 4:19

step 3 :Removing the Rivets from the Window 6:55

step 4 :Installing the New Regulator 9:20

step 5 :Resetting the Motor 14:45

step 6 :Reinstalling the Door Panel 15:08

Tools needed

Shop Products

Ford Taurus Mercury Sable Front Driver Side Power Power Window Motor & Regulator Assembly TRQ WRA51369

Part Details:

How To Replace Manual Window Regulator 1980-96 Ford F-150 F-250 F-350

step 1 :Removing the Door Panel

step 2 :Removing the Window Regulator

step 3 :Removing the Rivets from the Window

step 4 :Installing the New Regulator

step 5 :Resetting the Motor

step 6 :Reinstalling the Door Panel