The actuator diaphragm failed on both of mine. Before you buy the
seals, plug both vacuum hoses and try to raise the door. If you can,
then the diaphragm is damaged in some way and the unit must be
replaced. From what I know about Vettes, this is more often then not
the problem. The rod attachment point at the diaphragm is poorly
designed and executed causing the diaphragm to tear away from the
rod's crimped on retaining washers.
BTW, according to Terry Tanner only the earliest cars have 'vette
actuators. The rest have a Bricklin specific design (no, I don't
know when the changeover occurred). Once a Vette unit fails it
should be replaced with the later design. It seems the Vette unit
applies too much force to the mechanism assembly causing a much
higher failure rate of the diaphragm than the Bricklin version.
Please don't tell the Vette owners about the Bricklin units. Once
the inventory is gone, that's it as I understand it. If Terry is
selling them that cheap, he's doing us a big favor.
GM
-----Original Message-----
I found some interesting info on the Net after I sent the message
below.
First, the vette actuators are very expensive, about 104 per side.
Tanner and all seem to average around 50 -- perhaps we should let
the
Vette owners know. The more interesting thing that I found is that
they
sell a rebuild kit for 10.00 per unit. It seems that the same part
is
>always failing, the front seal. The parts and instructions are at
>http://www.zip-corvette.com/index.html. I intend on buying two of
these
>seals and doing the deed -- I will let everyone know whether they
work.
>Kim
|