My driver's side door handle on my E36 M3 coupe had been giving me trouble for a while. One day, I gave it a yank and heard a plinking sound. The door stopped opening from the outside at that point. Most people recommend taking the car to a mechanic because messing with the window is a PITA, but I decided to save some clams and do it myself.

WARNING: This isn't an easy/fast task the first time around. Give yourself plenty of time.

WARNING: You might drain your battery while doing this job because there will be quite a bit of window actuation but little motor usage. Hook the car up to a charger just in case.

0. PREFACE

You'll need these tools.


T20 torx bit
5mm hex bit
Pick tools and/or cotter pin tool
10mm wrench or socket
Dull butter knife or screwdriver
Needle nose pliers
Ruler
Depth gauge and/or calipers (maybe)
T30 bit (optional)
Work light (recommended)
Flash light (recommended)
Battery charger (highly recommended)

http://img329.imageshack.us/img329/1614/img6593resizecn7.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

This is a general diagram of where you'll be working. Blue is for door panel clips. Green is for rear window guide rail. Red is for window regulator clips.

http://img517.imageshack.us/img517/5170/img6606markedresizequ6.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

1. REMOVE DOOR PANEL

There are a bunch of DIY about this, so I'll make this quick. For more details, check this link (http://hock.net/m-door-panel-removal.php) (written by someone else).


Pop out and disconnect mirror controls.
Remove interior door handle trim.
Use screwdriver or dull butter knife to pop the door panel off the clips (located at the blue markings in the overview diagram.)
Disconnect speaker wiring.
Peel away vapor barrier.

2. DISCONNECT WIRING

Disconnecting the electrical wires can clear up some working space, so it's not a bad idea to get them out of the way. To get the lock wiring out of the way, disconnect the lock actuator and unclip the wire bundle from the door. You'll have to maneauver the connector a bit because it's a self-locking harness.

This would be a good time to disconnect the door handle wiring. It might give you a little more clearance for later to take off wiring clip now; turn it (counter-clockwice, I think) and pull it out.

3. MOVE WINDOW OUT OF WAY

The door window is the single greatest obstacle in preventing this job from being quick and easy. The Bentley manual says to remove the window outright, but you can save yourself a little trouble by just unclipping it and positioning it out of the way.

First, make reassembly easier on yourself by marking the locations of the 6 rear guide rail fasteners (green markings in the overview diagram.) There are two 10mm bolts facing the interior, two 5mm hex bolts under the door, and two 10mm nuts on the window dolly. After marking their original locations, remove the nuts and bolts and take the rear guide rail out of the door.

Remove the retaining clips holding the regulator to the window glass (red markings in the overview diagram). There are two of them in the rails at the bottom of the glass and they will be covered in grease. Use a pick or cotter pin tool to take the retaining clips out and pop the regulator arms out of the gliders. Since they are wear items anyway, you can throw the gliders and the clips out and use new ones for reinstallation. New gliders pictured below.

http://img517.imageshack.us/img517/1025/img6594resizerp3.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

By this time, the window will basically be floating in the door, so you'll have to hold it. Fortunately, the weather stripping at the top of the door and on the front guide rail will help prevent it from free falling. You should be able to raise/tilt/maneuver the glass and have it rest at an angle with the rear as high up as possible. Lowering the window regulator arms will give you more room to work. Note that the window will likely fall out of the front rail, so keep that in mind for reinstallation.

http://img396.imageshack.us/img396/4214/img6588resizekb4.jpg (http://imageshack.us) http://img517.imageshack.us/img517/7236/img6589resizehd7.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

4. REMOVE DOOR HANDLE AND PREPARE THE NEW HANDLE

Now, the crux of this DIY.

First, take off the door handle trim. It's been covered before, so just refer to this DIY (http://forums.bimmerforums.com/forum/showthread.php?t=232798) or whatever post you can dig up with the Search button. On coupe doors, there's a metal tab that will basically cover the sliding trim lock, so it might be easier to work from inside the door than through the access hole. You can kind of make it out in the next picture, but you'll see it when you get to this step.

Second, disconnect the door handle from the door lock. There are two things to take care of. Decouple the large metal arm on the door handle from the slotted lever in the lock. Then disconnect the hooking arm between the tumbler from the lock mechanism.

http://img396.imageshack.us/img396/5903/img6590resizerb7.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

Third, undo the door handle attachments. On the inside of the door, unclip the back of the retaining piston and pull it out. On the outside, unscrew the locking ring and remove the plastic washer (don't lose it!). Some other write-ups have suggested using a horologist's tool for removing the back of watches, but that's not necessary. I used a pair of needle-nose pliers without trouble.

http://img517.imageshack.us/img517/6631/img6587resizegx9.jpg (http://imageshack.us) http://img329.imageshack.us/img329/3070/img6592resizeqm4.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

That's it! Now pull out the door handle.

Here's a picture of the carnage in my door. Notice that no less than three things had broken: (1) the door handle arm, (2) top half of the the door handle assembly, (3) the cable holder. I imagine that the assembly had been broken for a long time, and arm was the straw that broke the camel's back.

http://img329.imageshack.us/img329/9436/img6543resizelp0.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

Transfer the cabling from the old assembly to the new one.

http://img396.imageshack.us/img396/2987/img6545resizefs1.jpg (http://imageshack.us) http://img517.imageshack.us/img517/7736/img6546resizeva2.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

5. TRANSFER THE LOCK TUMBLER

My old assembly came from a 4/95 car. There must have been a design change at some point because the tumblers are different between the original handle and the replacement! So keeping the old key will require transfering the key wafers from the old tumbler to the new one.

Drive out the retaining pin on the old tumbler. Put the key into the tumbler and pull everything out. I used a nail and a vice to do the work.

http://img396.imageshack.us/img396/1453/img6547resizexe9.jpg (http://imageshack.us) http://img329.imageshack.us/img329/7259/img6548resizemv0.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

Do the same for the new tumbler. I used a very small hex bit to drive out the retaining pin.

http://img396.imageshack.us/img396/325/img6550resizere3.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

Here's how the key works: As you push the key in, small wafers in the tumbler slide up and down. If your key matches the wafer arrangement, they'll all go down and allow the tumbler to rotate in the bore. You'll need to transfer all the wafers to the new tumbler in order to continue using the old key.

At the moment, the keys are the only thing preventing the wafers from falling all over the place. So, take a breath. Take the keys out of the tumblers and lay out each set of wafers. Reinstall them into the other tumbler, making sure not to lose the tiny springs in the wafter slots along the way. Put the new tumbler with the old wafters into the new handle assembly. You'll know you're finished when you can insert, turn, and remove the key from the tumbler without anything binding.

http://img517.imageshack.us/img517/8642/img6553censorresizetz0.jpg (http://imageshack.us) http://img396.imageshack.us/img396/2421/img6555censorresizefx7.jpg (http://imageshack.us) http://img329.imageshack.us/img329/7895/img6559resizekc2.jpg (http://imageshack.us) http://img517.imageshack.us/img517/9850/img6567censorresizeps8.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

Drive the retaining pin back into the tumbler.

6. OTHER MAINTENANCE/REPAIR

Since the door is already apart at this point, you might as well do the following:


Replace the sliders at the ends of the window regulator arms. Most likely, if you're replacing broken door handles, the sliders are already toast.
Remove the door lock and spray everything down with white lithium grease. You'll need the T30 bits to undo the bolts. If you're feeling extra enthusiastic, clean the bolts and refresh the Loctite blue.
Spray the inside of the door stop/check. This will help the door swing open.

If your key gets stuck in the tumbler when turning, check out the door lock. When you turn the key, the tumbler pulls an arm on the lock via a connecting rod. There's some plastic that's supposed to help guide things when all these things move (there's a lot of play in their movement), but that broke on my lock.

http://img517.imageshack.us/img517/1714/img6581resizeal8.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

Notice the V-shaped expanse of space between the black plastic? There's supposed to be plastic there. Unfortunately, you can't seem to order individual parts for the lock, so you'll have to ghetto-rig something if you want to save the expense of a new lock.

7. REINSTALLATION

Reinstallation, as they say, is the reverse of installation. Make sure you line up the window hardware to the markings made before. If not, you'll need to follow the adjustment procedure in the Bentley manual; for that, you'll need a depth gauge or some calipers.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

The following posts were useful when I was doing this job. There are a bunch of other threads that were useful, too, so I hope their authors don't mind that I may have forgotten to mention them. As always, thanks to the community for sharing their knowledge.


http://hock.net/m-door-panel-removal.php
http://forums.bimmerforums.com/forum/showthread.php?t=232798
http://forums.bimmerforums.com/forum/showpost.php?p=7086612&postcount=43
http://forums.bimmerforums.com/forum/showpost.php?p=3615057&postcount=4

Great write up and nice clear pictures. Submit this to bimmerdiy.com

Cheers for that!

i wish there was a write up like this when i had the door handle problem. maybe i would still have handles on my car. it was such a pain to get them out i never put them back in...

i now have shaved door handles with auto loc door poppers

but yeah.... nice write up

Dude, thats a solid write up. Nice job.

I'm trying to figure out what broke in my door before I rip it apart, did your handle get real easy to pull then about 90% through the handle movment get hard and you have to pull up and out on it to get the door to open? That's what happend to mine.

My door handle wouldn't do anything until the last few mm of travel, where I'd have to give it an extra yank to open the door. So I guess it sounds like what you're experiencing.

If the door operates fine from the inside, but the outside is giving you trouble, I'd think your door handle is due for replacement. It's not a hard job, but does take some time. The @#$%@# bobby pin clips on the white sliders is what makes this job a PITA IMO. Be prepared to slide the window up/down a couple of times before finding a spot with enough clearance through the door sheet metal.

Good luck.

BTW, thanks for the compliments, guys!

very nice.. how did you take off the upper exterior trim on the door handle? Great write-up, btw~~

very nice.. how did you take off the upper exterior trim on the door handle? Great write-up, btw~~
You mean the hard plastic trim around the door handle and the lock tumbler? There's a flat piece of metal (with a lip on it) that runs the length of the handle assembly (on the side facing the interior of the car); this piece locks the plastic trim in place. Push the slider and you'll be able to pull the trim off. See the links at the bottom of the DIY for better tutorials on how to do this.

can you take it off without removing the door panel?

btw, im talking about the plastic trim piece missing in this picture:

http://img329.imageshack.us/img329/3070/img6592resizeqm4.jpg

can you take it off without removing the door panel?

Yes, you can. I replaced the following part on the passenger door without taking the panel off. Be warned, though, that BMW decided to put a metal tab in front of the slider you need to push ONLY on coupe doors. Literally. You'll want to use something like a heavy-duty cotter pin tool (looks like a pick with a 90-degree bend; shown in the first post) to reach the slider.

http://www.pelicanparts.com/cgi-bin/smart/imgdsply.cgi?pn=51218122441-M9

This link will tell you a lot more.

http://forums.bimmerforums.com/forum/showthread.php?t=232798

EDIT: The hard plastic piece shown above also comes with a rubber piece that sits between the hard plastic and the door. The rubber cracks over time and (if I'm following you) is likely what you're trying to replace.

Cryptic, Someone jerked up hard on my handle and I lost the trim. I got new trim and now seehow to do the slider from the other diy. But somehow I lost that pin that you show in your gloved hand picture. I was thinking of making a pin to press fit in from outside with a nice tight fit but not sure how important the back clip is. Do you think I can get away without that clip? Is it easy to get at if I take the door panel off and not mess with the window?

Thanks, Jeff

Just got to the dealer and get the pin+clip. I'm sure it'll be cheap enough that it won't be worth your effort to jury-rig something on your own. I'm almost positive that you need the clip to keep the assembly attached to the door. Pretty easy job if you're just replacing the pin. Good luck!

ok, thanks!

Thank you for the write up.This is the same project I plan on doing next week.Perfect write up!!!!!!!! You dont know how much time you have saved me..........Thanks again

Haha mine was so much easier than this... makes me fell good looking at the new door moldings :)

Dude, thats a solid write up. Nice job.

Is it just me or is that some sort of blue tint on your window? I'm curious to see more pics.

Haha mine was so much easier than this... makes me fell good looking at the new door moldings :)

This is the only time I'm jealous of your 4-door guys ... I kid I kid :stickoutt

This is the only time I'm jealous of your 4-door guys ... I kid I kid :stickoutt

Honestly me too, me too.... i kid, i kid.... :)

+10000 on this thread, I have this job ahead of me and I'm printing this thing out....

BTW I put together my door handle and swapped cylinders/key tabs already soo that part is done, now for the damn window. THANK YOU again for this write up, I love the Bentley "This is a dealer serviced item only and we don't recommend you attempt this" BLAH, never stopped me before :-)

You have no idea just how much money you are saving us. I did it to your exact plans and it was soo much easier than taking it out. Thanks for this great DIY!!

sorry to bring this post from the dead, but i've been planning on working on this again this weekend. The first time, I got up to about step 3. Can anybody please further explain how to remove those clips from the window. This seems to be the only thing in my way at the moment.

what clips from the window? you mean the window regulators? if so just pull the metal pins

When I swapped mine out, I really didn't remove my window. I removed the old handle, then I took both the old & new handle I bought from the JY to the locksmith and he swapped out the tumblers for 10 or 15 bucks, I forget.:confused

Installing it when window was intact was a PITA unless you have someone with small hands to get in there. Nonetheless great detailed DIY'er write up Cryptic.:thumbup:

Thought I'd share my experience with the door handle. ;)

I pulled out the pins the last time, but it had no effect on the window. was i supposed to pull the window up, or is there something i'm missing?

great writeup. i referenced it multiple times today. unfortunately, i neglected to remember the trip to the stealership for the window sliders n cotters. so i have to reuse mine. the front one is kicking my ass, i cannot get my big hands in that little hole to put the damn cotter back on. i mean DAMN IT! all in all, the job was easy enough, i had problems getting the new handle lined up properly w/ the locking part of the mechanism, the latch part was easier. but it was one or the other. took me a solid hour of swearing and then taking deep breaths to get it all lined up. job took abt 3 hrs so far, w/ no printout of this or any laptop or anything out there. <sigh> it'll be easier next time!
now i gotta try and get that last slider locked in place later on before i even think abt the alignment or anything lol!

great writeup. i referenced it multiple times today. unfortunately, i neglected to remember the trip to the stealership for the window sliders n cotters. so i have to reuse mine. the front one is kicking my ass, i cannot get my big hands in that little hole to put the damn cotter back on. i mean DAMN IT! all in all

Thanks. :)

I feel your pain with the sliders. Theoretically, I think you should be able to put the slider on the rail, put the cotter pin on the slider, and push the dowel through. But it's a pain in practice. :mad

Keep at it ...

well i got it...but one of the sliders is so shot that i can't realign (one of the steps i DIDN'T do was mark my original window settings) so my window is open ever so slightly tonight. the bottom (or top, i turned it around time and again trying to make it work) of one is so shot that the dowel keeps popping out. so im going to the stealership tomorrow and probably paying 10 bucks each...they're 4 on pelican parts...for the sliders. hopefully i'll be able to get the window realigned or at least close. i've never messed around w/ them before.

WOW great write up and pics. perfect job.

Certainly is one of the best DIY write-ups. Pictures are very good. I have this book marked in case I ever need it!!

so after going to the dealership and shelling out 17.88 for 2 sliders and then spending another 2 hours trying to get it all to line up the proper way, i give up. the back of my left hand is all sliced up from the damn sheetmetal trying to get the window aligned from underneath and what not...blah blah blah. gonna pay a 19yr bmw master tech between 1 and 150 to do it monday night. supposed to have good weather this weekend and only have a bit of a gap in the front of the window now. im never messing with windows again. ever. never. not even if there is beer involved. ok..maybe if there is beer :)but no more. seriously.

CRYPTiC - pm Kevlar to move this into the DIY forum. This one is a keeper!

Hmmm subscribed :)
I have to do this ASAP since both doors don't work and I look stupid having to open the rear door to reach in and open the front door lol.

I've got to do this on the rear door of a 1997 328I. In an earlier post there was mention of jealousy for 4-door owners. Is that because this is easier to do in a 4-door? Also since it is a rear door, does that simplify further as there is no key mechanism?

Thanks in advance.

This is the biggest pain in the ass DIY project I've ever done.

Did anyone have problems aligning the connecting rod from the tumbler to the lock actuator? It's preventing me from aligning the handle correctly inside the door.

Did anyone have problems aligning the connecting rod from the tumbler to the lock actuator? It's preventing me from aligning the handle correctly inside the door.

I found this topic when i realized the connecting rod on my door detatched and I need to fix it.

I can't get it connected. Any tips?

Subscribed

I found this topic when i realized the connecting rod on my door detatched and I need to fix it.

I can't get it connected. Any tips?

Either remove the actuator or remove the handle (easier to maneuver). The reason why I had so much trouble was that the handle actually slides under a little notch on the door... make sure you push the handle toward the outside of the car so it slips under it when you position the handle. I know it's vague but it'll make sense later on.