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I wish I knew how to answer, I'll be honest i'm not sure. sorry. the only thing I can think of is that the brushes are not making a good contact on the spindle. That's just a guess though. I remember filing them down to get them to seat against the spindle and thought when doing it that if you didn't then they might not make a good connection. Perhaps someone else has thoughts on this.
PS It's nice to be back and to see how many views my thread has had over the last few years... I was blown away. I no longer own my 350z I traded up to a 2013 370z roadster, which I love btw. Still here to help though if I can.
BB
Thanks again BB That was my first thought also. I've cleaned the spindle numerous times but it still continues to give me fits. I certainly refuse to take it to a dealer so it can be their Guinea pig.
thank you for all the info about the 5th bow motor , i did not do the rebuild, i had sent it to the ebay guy who rebuilds these for 50$ , i also replaced the two elastic bands , i replaced the three phillips screws with allen head screws which made it easier to install the motor, again thank you
There appears to be a step missing. I have removed all of the screws around the motor but it is still stuck and will not come out. I can turn the motor either counter or clockwise indicating all of the screws are out. But, it will not lift out. Can anyone tell me why?
There appears to be a step missing. I have removed all of the screws around the motor but it is still stuck and will not come out. I can turn the motor either counter or clockwise indicating all of the screws are out. But, it will not lift out. Can anyone tell me why?
my motor needed a little help also, i rocked it front to back etc. and it came out its a tight mesh with gears, you did take out 5 bolts ?, when putting back in you need to turn the motor a little right to left or left to right with a little pressure on the top of motor to get the gears to mesh
HELP!!!! I have been following OP's instructions to the "t" and got all the screws out easily, the wiring harness off but the motor will not come out. It's as if it's attached from below in the middle. Any ideas?
Okay, so one thing that is not abundantly clear until you read all of these pages is the NUMBER of fasteners involved. To me looking at the first pic of the tutorial, there are 4, of course now that I've gnashed my teeth trying to figure out why it wouldn't come out, there are 5 fasteners.
I have attached a picture of a tool I purchased made by Kobalt at Lowe's for less than $6; it's a 1/4" drive socket with a hexagonal receiver for one of 3 bits it comes with. It was perfect for the job. The 5th screw located in the back was loosened by putting the socket/philips head screwdriver on to it and locking some vise grips around it and loosening it.
The model featured is my 2004 Touring Roadster, Current mileage is about 123k and I have never cleaned this motor or replaced the brushes before, so this is what you can expect if you are doing this for the first time.
Ok, so I've been wanting to do a how to guide for a while and this is a doozie! yup, 5th Bow Motor Repair!! If your 5th bow is getting stuck or not retracting your soft top in the storage compartment, the is a high probability that the brushes in the 5th bow motor are worn out. My how to will show you how to replace these brushes... The brushes can be bought online and they are the same ones used in the tutorial for fixing a sticking window motor, in fact this is pretty much the same as that, only easier!
What you'll need before you start.
1) A couple of hours spare time
2) A right angled (90 degree) phillips head screwdriver (or really short screwdriver)
3) Pair of suitable brushes got mine from Amazon (http://www.amazon.com/MBS5-Stand-Up-.../dp/B001BHLX0W )
4) Small socket set (not 100% needed but useful)
5) Soldering Iron, Flux and Solder
6) Scissors
7) Egg Box and Double Sided Sticky Tape (just messing!)
8) Electrical Contact Cleaner and Rag
9) Fine sand paper (the wives nail file would do!)
10) A couple of band aids just in case!
The whole process took me a couple of hours with help from domrvt (cheers dude!)
Ok first you want to cram yourself inside your Zee (if you are over 6ft I feel for you!) Everything from this point is in picture format so .....
Once I got the motor back in the car I re-attached the electrical harness and press the button for the roof, and voila! it worked, then put it all back together, now my roof works flawlessly! Hope this How To was of help to those (like me) who were facing a $1000 plus repair job! this only cost me a couple of hours and about $10.
Cheers, feel free to re-post this on any other forums that you know of where people are having the same issue!!!
If you have any questions please message me. This is my first how to, so feedback is welcome.
BlueBadge
PS You will notice that I didn't re-lube the components as I didn't have any grease on hand, but I definitely recommend it! (i'll do mine later!)
I know its been 6 years since OP first posted but i just fixed mine using your instruction so a lot of thanks to BB! I want to share 2 things for anyone doing this fix;
1. My motor assembly dont have the black gasket thing when i open it. I suspect it had been opened before, but it runs just fine without it.
2. And this is important; make sure your brush wire are routed EXACTLY as in pic 14. I didnt noticed it at first and route it to the sides. My motor didnt move at all. What happened was the wire was pinched between the brush and gear assembly holding it from making contact with the spindle. Hope this helps thanks again!! ~khai
Looks like the pictures are ont in the original post. Can it be reloaded or can someone send me a copy? I just bought a 04 roadster and looks like the 5th bow motor is not working.
Looks like the pictures are ont in the original post. Can it be reloaded or can someone send me a copy? I just bought a 04 roadster and looks like the 5th bow motor is not working.
Hi I am new to this forum and I can't see the pics posted. I tried in printable view and still nothing. Any suggestions. Thanks for everything and anything you can do.
This forum is a godsend! 5th bow motor went out and followed the steps (had to google pics) and only difference is I had motor sent out to
FL (mike on ebay). $51 later, reinstalled the motor and the top works again.
Did anyone in this thread posted brushes dimensions? Seems like Muchmore Racing MBS5 is discontinued, so I'm wondering if these brushes, used by some people to repair window motor (that looks the same in photos), will work for 5th bow motor:
Ok, I just finished repairing the 5th bow motor. And here are few notes that might be helpful:
1) Brushes dimensions: 4 x 4 x (10-13 ish) mm, hard to tell precisely cause original brushes were obviously worn out. My replacement brushes weren't the exact match, so I'll probably repeat the procedure when I find the better match.
2) Original guide suggests to remove plastic insert for brushes by wiggling it with finger, didn't work for me. Just use a tiny screw driver or a knife to pry it from the right side.
3) The part where brushes go has to be installed on the rotor/spindel with external metal cover on. First time I assembled it completely and when it was time to install the cover, it just sucked the spindle out because of magnetic force.
4) Brushes I found had shorter wire than needed, so I had to solder it right to the leftover of original wire. But soldering has to be really short and neat, cause wire has to be flexible.
PS: It didn't fix my issue entirely, need to repeat that with roof actuators, any guides for that? Motor has noticeably more power now, but it's pretty noisy as well, I blame brushes size, they seat a bit loosely, definitely not a good thing to leave it as is...
