Wiggly drivers side view mirror...drop kick it?

[Voymom]

As my title states, I have a wiggly, squirmy drivers side view mirror. I have tried super glue, hot glue, tape, and screaming. But it still shakes all the time. I don't think it's the actual unit so I haven't considered replacing it, although that very well may be the next thing I try after I drop kick the damn thing. It wiggles so much it is rendered useless, are there ANY other things I can try before I consider buying a new one?

When I glued and taped it I glued and taped the unit where it folds in, so that's why I'm thinking it's the mirror itself. Is there a way to take the mirror out of the unit to see if a clip or something is broken?

Thanks

 

[Uncle Blazer]

If anybody wants a photoshop project for this afternoon, putting Tami's face on a Xena body doing a roundhouse kick to Phantom's mirror would be pretty sweet.

I guess if the next option is to replace the entire housing, you might as well try to pop the lense off/out.

 

[03envoy]

Mine does this too! Drives me crazy!

 

[Ace1875]

It's normal in all trailvoys I drove

 

[jham]

It's normal in all trailvoys I drove

mine don't vibrate at all. Can you make it stop when you driving by hold the case or mirror? I bet you could search around there's a member that changed there mirrors sohe might be willing to sell his stock ones now

 

[Ace1875]

Well only the mirror vibrates a bit

 

[Boricua SS]

yea mine dont vibrate either... they stay put...

i would check out 1933trader on ebay if youre gonna be in the market for a mirror... usually pretty cheap, and they specialize in trailvoy's.. that is of course if you cant fix it...

 

[hotrod1984s10]

The issue is more than likely with the spring retainer holding the mirror on, behind the glass. The spring retainer holds tension on a spring that securely holds the mirror onto it's mount. The spring allows you to rotate the mirror while holding tension not allowing it to wobble. The spring retainer rusts and eventually loses tension on the spring, or in my case breaks off alltogether. You can remove the back of the mirror to access the spring to repair the issue. The fix is to drill a hole through the post the spring sit's on and insert a cotter pin through it. The cotter pin replaces the spring retainer by holding tension on the spring. I fixed mine in about an hour. The only side issue is removing the bottom cover on the mirror. This has to be removed to reach clips that hold the back of the mirror on. The bottom cover is held on with a 8mm torx screw that broke off on mine when I tried to loosen it off. I fixed that by drilling a hole and inserting a stainless screw beside the broken screw. GM won't just sell you a retainer, you have to buy a new mirror as it's a "non serviceable part" according to them. It really is an easy fix and will eliminate the "wobbles".

 

[Sparky]

Yep that's how I fixed my passenger mirror wobble. First I tried just pounding the retainer on again, which helped until I folded the mirror and it loosened back up. Then I pounded it down tight again, drilled the hole, and put a cotter pin through the shaft to keep the retainer in place. Been fine ever since.

 

[Chickenhawk]

I agree. Once you get behind the glass, you will instantly see why it wobbles. The spring retainer weakens with time.

You can remove the retainer and pound it flat again and this will help for a while if the retainer still has all the teeth.

Once the mirror starts to wobble on its post, it will open the hole a bit. I put a sheet of plastic around the post to tighten up the post in the hole fit and flattened my retainer. It has been good for 3 years now.

 

[Voymom]

Thanks everyone!!!! I will have to try and get the glass out some other day, we're having some bad weather right now....go figure.

I was really hoping that drop kicking it would have eliminated my problem lol there are days when I can tolerate mishaps and there are days like today
I would just replace the mirror, but if they are known to deteriorate over time, might as well try and save some money by trying to fix it. But knowing my luck, I may end up breaking the damn thing in the process. I swear that this truck is out to get me sometimes.....

 

[hotrod1984s10]

You don't have to remove the glass to fix it. The back cover of the mirror housing comes off to access the spring. You have to remove the bottom cover to get at the clips to remove the back cover.

 

[MacMan]

You don't have to remove the glass to fix it. The back cover of the mirror housing comes off to access the spring. You have to remove the bottom cover to get at the clips to remove the back cover.

Correct. I removed the back cover on both mine (4 yrs ago), tapped the holding clip on the plastic post down a little farther, drilled a small hole just above the clip and inserted a cotter pin as mentioned in one of the posts above....problem solved ever since.

 

[Sparky]

1) Remove back cover of mirror (I do believe there is a write-up on this for painting the covers)
2) Pound the retainer clip down tight using a socket and a hammer
3) drill small hole through the post
4) insert cotter pin
5) reattach back cover.

It takes all of 30 min, max, and sure beats buying a whole new mirror for something so simple.