1983-6 Cougar/Thunderbird Dew Wipe Replacement

1983-6 Cougar/Thunderbird
BeltLine Moulding / Dew Wipe R&R

Difficulty: Medium
Time Required: ~3 hours per side

For starters, here is an example the of old cracked dew-wipe on my 95k mile '86 XR7:

[image]https://i.imgsafe.org/f181322655.jpg[/image]

For the replacement seals,
I ordered Fairchild 1369-4x2 (pack of 2) "Belt weatherstrip/Window Scraper Seal" from rockauto for <$30 + S&H

The tools you will need:

[image]https://i.imgsafe.org/f18277fc54.jpg[/image]

- drill with bit(s) sized to your rivets (3/32" &/or 1/8")
- tin snips
- 1/4" ratchet, short extension, 10mm & 3/8" sockets
- Dremel tool with cut-off wheel attachment & (a bunch of) cut-off wheels
- #2 Phillips & couple 'regular' screwdrivers
- rivet gun & rivets (I mainly used 3/32" x 5/16")
- Sharpie pen (I used purple to mark on the black)
- safety equipment for eyes, ears, and dust

1. Remove door mirror interior trim bit;
remove screw then wiggle trim up out from under door panel.

[image]https://i.imgsafe.org/f181a93e64.jpg[/image]

Now remove (3) 10mm nuts holding mirror on.
Slide mirror out from door.
On this side (passenger) the foam gasket stayed stuck to the door;
on the drivers side it stayed stuck to the mirror..

[image]https://i.imgsafe.org/f181d17560.jpg[/image]

Gently remove the gasket to yield a hidden Phillips screw (remove).
The trim has a 'break' in it to allow passing the power-mirror wires thru.
Do that as shown here:

[image]https://i.imgsafe.org/f181e097a6.jpg[/image]

2. Remove B-pillar moulding;
This is mounted with 2 spring-wire clips in front, and 4-5 plastic retainer clips in the back.
There is probably a special tool for removal,
but I gently worked/slid the trim rearward against the spring clips until the trim cleared the rear retainer clips.

[image]https://i.imgsafe.org/f1815929a4.jpg[/image]

3. Open door and remove 3/8" 'body nut' holding the rear portion of beltline molding down.

[image]https://i.imgsafe.org/f181b70821.jpg[/image]

Now, To remove the moulding, roll the window all the way down, start in the middle of the door,
with both hands shove fingers down next to window, grab the moulding and wiggle/work upward.
This will take some effort and the old dew wipe may start crumbling in yur grasp..
after some work you can feel it loosening and lifting.
Once it has been loosed some, move to the rear side of the molding and commenced to work it loose from back to front.
Gently & gradually lift (the rear) & pivot (at the front) the moulding for it is 'hinged' at front to the A-pillar trim.

[image]https://i.imgsafe.org/f18237731d.jpg[/image]

By continuing to pivot the molding you can release it from under the A-pillar trim:

[image]https://i.imgsafe.org/f1821b8504.jpg[/image]

Whew ! that was fun. These first three steps took me 15 minute. The work has only begun ..

4. Use a Sharpie to lay out yur cut lines:
You will be removing just the 'wipe' portion of the existing assembly,
and leaving the portion containing the mounting staples, body clips, and window guide.

[image]https://i.imgsafe.org/f181f6ef22.jpg[/image]


[image]https://i.imgsafe.org/f18216e930.jpg[/image]

5. Use Dremel with cut-off wheel to separate.
Please wear eye protection!
You may wish to also have sound protection or headphones for music (this is the long boring part) and a dust-mask (it's dirty).
After an hour and 15-20 cut-off wheels you should have:

[image]https://i.imgsafe.org/f18268f579.jpg[/image]

I forgot to get a picture,
but I added 2 rivets to the remaining moulding portion where the dissection had left a bit unsupported.

6. Lay the new dew wipe out onto the moulding;
Use Sharpie to mark, then snips & Dremel to cut 'reliefs' for the body clips and window guide.
The snips were deforming the new dew wipe, so resorted to using the Dremel for the 'horizontal' cuts.

[image]https://i.imgsafe.org/f182abf9c4.jpg[/image]

7. Lay the new dew wipe back on the moulding, and drill & rivet together.

Generally you want to use the "shortest" rivets you can,
to minimize the leftover on the backside which can potentially interfere with re-assembly.
I used 3/32" diameter x 5/16" long for most of these. A couple places there were 3 layers so I used a 3/8" long rivet.

You'll note the bottom of the new dew wipe *between the clips* does 'overlap' a portion of the old,
but the area around the body clips and window bumper should not overlap.

[image]https://i.imgsafe.org/f182daa5f0.jpg[/image]

8. Re-assembly is the reverse of removal.
Before reassembly, clean the portions of the window which are concealed under the moulding.
I also cleaned and waxed both sides of the window to allow easier movement against the now snugger dew wipe.

[image]https://i.imgsafe.org/f182c356d1.jpg[/image]

[image]https://i.imgsafe.org/f181277270.jpg[/image]

Not perfect. But WAY better !
Ah the feel of the supple felt-flocked rubber under your forearm..

I suppose some trim adhesive or more rivets could be used to eliminate some of the 'pucker',
but no-one but me & you will ever notice that..

nice write up!

-J0N

Awesome write up!!

Great article! Thanks.

Awesome write-up! Thank-you for providing this! I like your mention of being able to rest your forearm on the door because I thought about doing it the other day but didn't want to because: 1) dry-rotter dew-wipes aren't the most comfortable thing in the world and 2) I didn't want to chip any more pieces off! Haha

This article is going to become a permanent fixture of the new Tech Articles section!