Ok guys so I looked around for a thread on anyone who repaired their mirrors to work smoothly like when the car was new. As it turns out there is alot of advice but no one posted up pictures so i thought I would document my repair. About a year ago my passenger mirror started studdering off and on. Then all the time. 2 months later my driver side followed. I heard about re-lubing by simply moving the mirror to its furthest corners and adding more grease from the sides, but in a short period of time that quick fix will come back again and again. So I decided to remove all the old grease and add new grease.

First, make sure you do not use a screw driver. It can not only scratch your paint but it can also cause a pivot point on the mirror and cause it to break. I used a panel remover.


There are self locking clips at 10, 2, 4, and 8 o'clock. Pick one corner, and once it pops off simply slide the mirror in the opposite direction and it will come off easily.

Notice the clips? There are eight (8)...four corners in pairs. Once you get one off, the rest slide out.

After it is out remove the two wires from the mirror housing. This is not entirely necessary, but I don't like to feel restricted with elbow space. If you do decide to take them out i suggest you mark them so that you put them back on the same way. I personally don't know the scematics and whether or not it is necessary, but i don't take any chances.



Remove this center #20 screw and the center cap, screw, and spring will come off. Put aside the screw and spring and clean this bad boy up. All that yellow gunk it what is making your mirror click.





It should look like this...


I used basic white lithium grease from auto zone for $3 and the final result should look something like this




After you put it all back together screw back in the spring with the screw...make sure you don't over tighten the screw. once the screw reaches the end STOP tightening. This slack alows the mirror to move around, overtighening will only cause your mirror to freeze up. After the screw is in, plug up your wires and simply snap the mirror back in place. Be very careful when doing so because mirrors don't bend! make sure you dont create an access point, use your entire hand as you push the mirror back into place. DO NOT USE YOUR FINGERS as they will cause the mirror to crack. This is a $50-60 replacement, so I would take that seriously. I did the reverse of removing it. slide in one half of the clips until they grab, then the third one, then finally push back on the fourth tabs until they click. After this you will enjoy smooth quiet reversing again...oh yeah.
Thanks for reading, thanks are appreciated.

 

Great post. It should be added to the Service Department.

 

Awesome thread.

I will have to try this!

 

Great job on the install, u have to have some steady hands for that.............dont look forward to doing this in the future, lol

 

Thanks man, that crackling annoyed the heck out of me to the point where I just dissabled it. Now it works like butter.

 

Thanks for the great detail.

 

NICE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

and FINALLY!!!! i've never had this problem but its great to finally see the fix.

Good job OP.

 

THANKS!! I will have to do this to both of my mirrors.

 

Outstanding, sure wish you would have done this a year ago.

 

I want someone else to try this out to confirm it works but for such a simple fix I might as well be the damn hamster lol

 

Do it ^ !!!!

 

Very nice write up with pics. Just the kind of thing many of us peruse websites such as this for.
For we non-modders, a good repair pictorial is really appreciated. I will certainly try this. My highly yellowed/browned mirrors are quite jerky!!

 

Great "How To" with pics. Tried it, works great, thanks!

I would not have done this without seeing how it looked on the inside from your pics and even then I kept thinking I was going to break the glass. Smooth as butter.......

 

Yeah, it's going on a week so far and still smooth as butter. It even rained the other day and that was the test for me and it passed . I was only concerened about the grease and how long it will last in comparison to oem, but I'll make sure I post if and when it starts to studder again...hopefully not for a long time.

 

The stealer tried to charge me $80.00 to fix this when I was having other work done, so I told them to kick rocks because I will do it myself. Now I actually know what to do.

 

will try this once i get the lubee ready..

 

I tried this two days ago and can confirm that it works! However, I didn't have any grease so I use shin etszu grease lol, it's not like I ever use it anyways. I suggest putting large amounts on, along inside where you wipe all the old yellow grease, I was playing with the switch with the mirror still off and it seems the reason it makes noises is because when the mirror tilts down, it scrapes the grease backwards but doesn't respread the grease when you put the car back in drive when it goes up.

 

FYI, everyone who has mirror clicking should re-spread the existing factory grease by adjusting each mirror all the way up, down and to each side several times every couple or three years.
That cured my TL's mirror stutter and "clicking" when angling downwards in reverse.

 

I tried that already, I tried all the remedies with no change, I even took a long tube and sprayed inside the mirror. Moving it up and down in all ways didn't work for me neither. This is a great fix!

 

it works great, fixed it 4 days ago and still good after a car wash.

 

that's the exact problem right there...the car wash when they spray water right into the housings. Also I'm interested to see those who did this fix in a couple weeks what they experience with using white lithuim grease because that grease does slowly dissolve away. I may be using the wrong word in dissolve but you get the drift.

All in all it's a great diy fix as I do have this problem too and as soon as I get me car back I'll look into doing this.

 

I've still got a ton of Mercedes sunroof grease. I will try that slippery stuff and see how it goes.....

 

So about a week and half later, one rainy day, one car wash later and it is still as smooth as butter. Like CubanLynx84 says, i think rain, car washes, and weather are the reasons why the stuttering happens in time. White lithium grease is water resistant, but to stay on the safe side I suggest staying safe by closing in your mirrors while washing your car. I also think synthetic will be more durrable for this project. But so far others have successfully tried this method and I will be sure to let you guys know how long this method works. The cool thing is that once you have done this, if you chose the wrong type of lubrication, you will know how to do it again and it will probably take you less than 30 min the second time around. In all honestly, i'm extremely satisfied with the results I have. And if stealerships are charging nearly $100 to fix, I would go with DIY and save some time and $. I'm glad you guys are all finding this info helpful. Good luck and be sure to post your results, good or bad, so we can all learn together.

 

I have an even better idea. Why not drill a hole in the inner plastic housing, the part that rotates, so that you can tilt the mirror to the extreme in one direction and just insert a small tube connected to a lithium grease spray can, and grease away without taking apart the mirror. This way, should the problem come back, you have an easier fix. Is this a possibility for those who have done the fix?

Ace

 

Gonna do this tomorrow. My passenger mirror is clicking and I thought it needed to be replaced

 

I told the dealership about this problem and they said they would have to replace the whole mirror assembly. Thiefs. Anyways I didn't do it and now I just do the up, down, left, right thing. But that is every two weeks it seems.

Here is a question that I can tag onto this thread. My side view mirror rattles when I am driving around. It's pretty annoying. Does that mean that one central screw may be loose? Do you think that if I do this procedure the rattle will go away?

 

the mirror has defeated me! I'm afraid to pry to hard...I don't wanna break the glass!

any other tips?

 

^If you do break the glass, I believe its only $15 for a replacement.

 

Good post, I am going to try this this weekend. Thanks!

 

^I just tried this and it fixed my problem. My mirror has been stuttering and clicking every time I put the car in reverse, I thought I would have to replace something in there. It's all better now.
Thanks Will.
It's also good to know that when this stops fixing the problem, it's easy enough to re grease it. great write up OP.

 

OMGXORS I need to do this.
Where can I get me one of these panel removers

 

Bought a set of trim/panel removers at harbor freight for $5.99. So far they work as they should.

 

I did this fix this morning and it worked great. I used lubriplate 105 (engine assembly lube-it's what I had handy). As a side note, when I had the car in under warranty to fix the click, they replaced the entire assembly instead of just changing the lube.

 

Awesome thread!

Scheduled my car for an oil change and to get this looked at on my passenger side next week. I have the extended warranty so it won't cost me more than $25 no matter what they do. But this look easy enough I guess I could save that.

I have some marine grease in a tub, do you think that would be more water resistant than white lithium?

 

Did this last friday and i have to say it works great.

Used teflon grease that I have for my bicycle.

 

OP you are my hero. This is the single most annoying thing about my car, now theres a $3/20 minute fix. THANK YOU.

 

Very nice write up!! Thanks a lot! I am going to do this tonight.

 

I have this issue on my 2g I'm wondering if it's the same problem. The clicking only occurs when I use my key fob and the memory settings kick in. That's when the clicking starts on my passenger side.

 

Old post but wanted to say how good it works. I had Shin Etsu (every TL owner should have a tube) and it worked fine.

Also to help those that might be timid about prying off the mirrors this should help.

 

sweeett! you guys alll rock! Doing my mirror maintenance soon. =D I sure wish i had access "Molly lube" still. Aircraft grade grease that was probably called White lightning? I dont really remember...its been a while since i was in the tool crib.