Boosted Falcon

Installing power windows to the almighty E-series.

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NOTE: The E-Series Owners Club and the writers of the articles take no responsibility for any damage or problems or grief that may be a result of following one of our articles. Make sure you know what you are doing, are confident and competent before commencing any activity. You do so at your own risk!
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This is a VERY broken down way of how to do a power window install the way that I did it. There is another way using aftermarket stuff here (http://fordmods.com/forums/documents.php?doc=21), but of course you cant add extra goodies afterwards with this way without additional cables such as the door lamps, and thats about it actually. But you cant add them without extra wiring. Remember that.
It explains hopefully everything so that a complete noob can nail it, first shot, no dramas. Experienced people will just have to sift through the stuff you already know, deal with it!

Please read everything first so that you have a clear understanding of what’s involved.

Special thanks go to John (EFFalcon) for support, being the go-to guy for me, and supplying the parts cheap. Also to Jimmy (ebgt302) for more parts sold cheap.

This is able to be done fronts only.
if you are after fronts only, and dont want the possibility of changing to all 4 later, then by all means take the body loom from a futura, XR, or other model with the specs you're after. Just bare in mind that different models have different looms, and thus require different switches in the front (centre console). Same process, just with no rear install and obviously 4 x less rivet nuts. You could also opt for Fairmont/Ghia, but dont install anything in the rears, just leave them winders. that would also work. I did this and there was about 4 weeks between fronts and rears. Fronts worked fine during this time.
Wagons and other LWB models i assume will be SLIGHTLY different in the positioning of the loom mounts etc, so pull it all from same car. sedans from sedans, wagons from wagons, and LWB from LWB.
I dare say that all you do is rather than pull everything out from an EF as i needed, pull from an EA, EB, ED, EL or appropriate N Series. Power window mechanism mounting points are all same for all E-Series.

Tools required:

Screwdriver – Phillips and normal
Hammer and centre punch of a sort
Power drill and 5mm drill bit (metal drilling)
Pop Riveter (depending)
Torque Keys
Socket wrench with socket set – metric

Others may be required for other models than EF. Mine’s EF, so I only know that one.

Bits and Pieces:

4 x power window mechanisms
Fairmont or Ghia body loom (Must be same model)
Door looms from Fairmont or Ghia (Must be same model)
Switches for centre console and rear doors.
8 x M6 rivet nuts part number V820134S from Ford
Rivets
A small length of cable – 40A rating. .5m is plenty.
Fairmont or Ghia door trims.
Rivets OR nut and bolt, no longer than 2cm.
Wire clip - available at any electric store. place 2 wires in, clamp down, instant elctrical connection. Pic to be added soon

Time
Swap over body loom - took me approx 7 hours start to finish.
Window mechanisms - from trim off to trim back on, allow between 30 and 120 mins depending on competency per door.
Door looms - bugger all, maybe 10 mins max.

Money
I managed this all for just over of $200. trims and all.
Cost break down -
Body loom - $20 from 'U Pull It' wrecker
window mechanisms - $20 ea. rears $40 ea. fronts.
Switch (centre console) - $40 ($80 at wrecker)
Door looms - free with mechanism ($20 ea from wrecker)
Cable 40A - $5 for 4 x more than needed, but that was minimum buy.
Door trims with rear switches - $30
M6 Rivet nuts - $27/$30 from Ford Spare Parts.

Hoenstly, don't expect yours to be as cheap, unless you really hunt around, or get lucky like i did. This can range up to about $700 depending on the price you pay for everything.

What’s What

If you’re anything like me, you’re wondering WTF is a body loom!!?? Door loom? WTF!?

Right, so here we explain a lil bit.

Body loom:
This piece of cable runs from the driver’s side right kick panel through to the rest of the car. It simply unplugs from its connections. It runs through to the driver side mirror, and door loom (will explain in a second). Also runs all the way down the driver’s side, plugs into the door button (the one that turns the interior light on when door is opened), continues down, over into the boot where first doubles back to hook into the rear demister and then back to the book where it hooks into speakers, tail lights, around to brake lights, across to fuel pump and fuel door release.

Door loom.
Much simpler, this one just connects to the body loom on one side, and the power locking actuator, and soon to be power windows as well as fronts connecting to the speakers.


Step 1.
Remove EVERYTHING!

Firstly, for ease of not stuffing round here and there as you go along, do it all in one hit.
Remove the seats. Fronts come out with 4 bolts. Use your torque key to remove them by sliding the seats back to remove the front bolts, and forward for the rear bolts. The rears come out by folding down the backrests. Unbolt these (socket set) after you unhook the carpet that’s attached to the back of them. Once the back rests are out, push the base towards the tail of the car and up.
Next the centre console. There’s a number of screws holding in the dash, and while not required, I took it out to be 100% safe not to kill my centre console. Unscrew all of these, and the dash will just pull out. Make sure you unplug all the looms or it’ll never come free. Moving on to the centre console, start under the lid of it. There’s a few screws here. Just work your way along patiently until it all comes out. If you have an auto, the t-bar surround will need to come out. This is held in by 3 wedges that hold it in place. Jimmy it out with a flat head screw drivers being careful not to destroy it. You’ll also need to remove the t-bar itself. Just unscrew it and it’s gone.
Now that all of this is out, you need to be taking out the carpet. Remove kick panels, door rubber, unbolt seat belts and then just pull out the carpet.
Now as you’d think, out with the white plastic support for centre console. Just unscrew. Nice and easy. Once this is done, you’re seeing black rubber lying over the top of the wires. Unbolt the handbrake from the floor to remove this.

Step 2.
Remove Body Loom.

Now you car is all naked, just unplug that big lump of wires you can see. Unplug it from everywhere you see it. Remember, don’t CUT wires, this is BAD. Trust me on this one. This also goes into the passenger side repeater. I found that it was easier to attack that one from the wheel arch. Just unscrew and twist out the globe. Unplug it all and then throw it in the bin.
What your car now looks like (EF)



Step 3.
Replace with new Body Loom and re assemble.

Hook it all back together. Lights back in their spots, everything connected that was originally connected. Now, before carpet and all go back in, the power cable. This connects to the fuse block by stuffing the wire into the spot with PWR WDW on it. Whack a 30A fuse in and done there. The other end connects to the Grey/Yellow cable in the body loom. Make the cable hidden as you like, and then connect with the magic lil clamp thingy.
This is the only electrical work you need to do, and as you see, no soldering needed.
Now replace centre console (where there’s a new loom, drill a hole in the white bit big enough for the loom to fit through and feed it through), carpet, dash, and seats in the reverse order that you pulled them out. Piece of cake. Mmmmmmmm….cake….
When doing this, add your switches to the centre console (just held in by 2 screws) and attach the cables.
Remember to make sure everything will line up nicely before bolting everything back down only to realise you didn’t put items X, Y and Z in the 100% right spot and you have to re-do everything like 4 times. It takes a lot longer this way (again, trust me, I know)

Step 4.
The window mechanisms.

Remove door trim and speaker if present. Then remove the foam. Careful to minimise the tears you put in the foam, as it goes back on. Drivers door needs the power mirror loom unplugged (if optioned), so do that.
The set up in front of you (passenger door)


Punch out the centre piece of the rivets holding the winder mechanism in place. Drill out the rivets until the mechanism drops loose. Next unbolt your guide from the door and window.
-Important-
Make sure you have someone/some tape holding the window up. The last thing you want is for the window to drop and break as you are removing all of its support.
Feed this out from the door through the hole in the bottom **insert lols here**

Feed the new mechanism in and make sure the power bit is facing the right way for attachment. Re bolt the guide to the window, then to the door (is a Pain in the Ass!) Once this is done, use your bolts or rivets, whichever is your weapon of choice, and attach the mechanism to the door. It should align perfectly regardless of which model the winders are from and which model your car is, provided it’s all E-Series.

Spray a bit of silicone spray down the runners, that is, the black rubber either side of the window that the window runs through.

Step 5.
Door loom

The fronts and backs are different, so first, front:
The rubber between the door and body when it’s open? It has a use! That’s the door loom and that’s what you’re pulling out. It’s attached to the body loom, so unplug here, and replace with new one so you don’t lose the looms. Now pull out from the door. Just unplug everything it’s attached to and pull it out and this is now bin worthy too. Feed the new one back into the door and re-connect. You now should be able to use you power window without any ignition. Yay!

The rears:
Similarly, there is a rubber connection that goes to the door, and into the body. It runs down the door and into a lower section of the car. Just pull out, unplug, re-plug and replace rubber.
NOTE: your rears will NOT work until your switches are fitted.

Step 6.
Door trims.

If replacing EF trims with EL trims, you will need to slightly modify the way on which the trim attaches. 2 of the screws on the EF attach sideways, which is different to the rest of the screws and a small plastic piece was added for this. If you’re using EL trims, those screws fit the same as everything else and you’ll need to pull those plastic bits out. Brute force and a set of pliers works.
You will now need to fit your Fairmont/Ghia trims, and thus will need to fit the M6 rivet nuts for the trims to attach properly. This has been done by many by using a nut and bolt through the middle and tightening as it costs $$$$$$ for the actual tool.
I went somewhere that had the tool and paid $15 for them to do it for me. Easy as.
They need to be fitted to the following holes on each door.


Otherwise you’re all set. No need to remove the little bronze coloured piece either. It’s not in the way, so just leave it.

Step 7.
ENJOY!

Me personally, I felt so happy that I sat there and wound the windows up and down for a good 10-15 mins. Good times.

Hope all goes well.
Brenton

Real handy

you are the best i just bought a wagon for the electics too put in mine an was just about too search the net but its here thanks a bunch will let you know how i go

Great writeup, I guess this is what you wanted me to check out last night?

just wondering if anyone knows if this is the same as ED? and can you do just front for EDs?? like how the EF XRs came as?

Great writeup mate!

Commando - yes. figured id just post away anyway, but any addons appreciated.

Stav - I should have added, This is able to be done fronts only.
if you are after fronts only, and dont want the possibility of changing to all 4 later, then by all means take the body loom from a futura, XR, or other model with the specs you're after. Just bare in mind that different models have different looms, and thus require different switches to the front. Same process, just with no rear install and obviously 4 x less rivet nuts.
Wagons and other LWB models i assume will be SLIGHTLY different in the positioning of the loom mounts etc, so pull it all from same car. sedans from sedans, wagons from wagons, and LWB from LWB.
I dare say that all you do is rather than pull everything out from an EF as i needed, pull from an EA, EB, ED, EL or appropriate N Series. Power window mechanism mounting points are all same for all E-Series.

Note - added to first post

Thanks for good comments!
keep em coming - makes me feel all special

thanks mate, and yeh excellent post!!

not a bad tutorial, im gettin something like that installed in my car in a couple of weeks.

getting it done or doin it yaself?
how much is that setting you back if option a?

probably about $750 incl parts and labour, but thats just an estimate, only catch is that im getting full fairmont electrics put in incl BEM. SO that means cruiuse, climate, windows etc etc.

and you dont want all that??
if you get the parts, ill do it cheaper than that for ya.
catch of that is that i do it at your house, and it takes a FULL day.
Brenton

also add to this that if your doing the conversion on an EF EL it would be best to change the window seal with an EB ED one as they are felt not rubber

the whole concept of rubber and glass was ment to be an improvement but failed miserably causing windows to stick and not go up and down properly over time.....you can spray all the silicon/lanolin/graphite or lube of your choice on the rubbers but over time they will return the same way....as summer hits all the crap you spray down the rubbers turns to glue/sticky shit

the best fix for this is using the EA EB ED felt style window seals they actually help the window slide a lot better and generally fix any of the sticking problems Ive done this to over a dozen cars now and never had another problem

..::Phoenix::.. wrote:and you dont want all that??
if you get the parts, ill do it cheaper than that for ya.
catch of that is that i do it at your house, and it takes a FULL day.
Brenton

yeh but its gettin done with my manual conversion so yeh im gettin it all done in one shot

fair nuff.

I was just wondering if anyone new how many wires are on each window electric motor. I am wanting to put electric windows in the front only. I was thinking of just wiring the motors to a custom switch panel because when i put my car pc in i will be using the proper windows switch spot for power/reset and usb. Any ideas on how to wire it up custom would be great cheers. Great tutorial though will help with putting the motors etc in.

2 per motor mate. talk to me on msn can tell ya exact how to do it.

Cheers will do thanks

look @ post 1.

has a link for all the after market stuffs there for ya

buy a ghia in the first place...dont have t o **** around with the pwr windows/ climate conttrol conversion etc..


tightarses

lol

sorry im bored ... no where else to post

my eb xr8 came with the loon standard. just gotta change the inner door loon fit a power window to it and place a fuse

In EA-ED If you have cruise control you will have the power window body loom and vice versa.

great write up mate!

ta. took a suprisingly small amount of time.
anything i do now, i think ill be taking pics and do a write up for (provided it works).
see if i end up doing this tweeter install - need some advice first, see how we go...then maybe be time for some mechanical work...

i was just wondering i have a loom from a nf fairlane just wondering if i could use that in a ef gli?

When doing a power window conversion, does the body loom have to be from the matching model? EG. EA needs EA ghia loom?. Or can you use a different model body loom or is smartlock and shiz involved in that?

Cheers Danny

Id stick with the matching model's loom, as there are differences between all the boxcars, and between EA/B and EB2/D are massive differences.

depends how you plan on doing it, if you're going to replace the WHOLE bodyloom, then i'd look at getting something from a similar car.
if you're going to strip out the power window stuff and add it to ur existing wiring, then there wouldn't be as much of a need.

im plaining on putting the nf window loom in is there anything i should know about?

just thought id add to this seeing as i did it on mine today, if your doing this in an EA-ED that already has cruise, then uve got it pretty easy.

cos its already got the body loom for it, i did the centre console first so that u have the controls ready to test the mechanisms when u get them in

change the door looms over before u get the mechanism in, u gotta take the plastic panels off and on the passenger side its easier to take the ecu out as well, dont unplug just remove it from its bracket drivers side the loom is behind the carpet stuff.

when putting the new mechanism instead of using rivets on the motor part, use 1/4inch by 1/2 inch long bolts, and also some 1/4 inch spring washers i used these probs not necessary but i did anyway.

also make sure u put some grease or oil or wd40 stuff on the wire bit otherwise it sounds like shit and doesnt work 100%

im doin the rears tomorrow hopefully, but im pretty impressed with it so far, considering ive been putting it off since christmas
hahaha

have u got a ghia or the model which u have to provide the whole loom for like i have to do for my s pack

very nice tutorial. just wondering if there is any way at all you could branch of of an exsisting
loom from an ef gli???
i want fronts only and was thinking of buying all the parts and getting the inner doors and switches from the wreckers and paying an auto elec to do it for me (to busy to do it myslef working all the time).
i would prefer that he would'nt have to take out nearly all the interior to swap the loom over.

travs ea-xr6 wrote:have u got a ghia or the model which u have to provide the whole loom for like i have to do for my s pack

do u mean me?
if so no i dont have the loom, well i do but its in my car, i was lucky cos i had cruise so body loom was there, just had to swap motors and smaller door looms which are easy as ****, motors a bitch but thats only drilling out the rivets.

love the tutorial great stuff just wondering whats involved in changing over the door looms i have a 93 eb gli wagon with cruise control and i have the body loom but need to change the door looms do i need to cut and solder any wires into existing door looms or do i just get door looms from another model and just plug them in to my existing looms just need to know before i go any futher cause ive allready fitted the centre console power window switches i can get a set of door looms from a couple of wrecks but ones a ef and the other ones a el are they the same can i still use them

hey mate yeah you dont need to solder etc any wires, you just need EB/ED fairmont etc door looms, they just unplug and plug into your body loom, they look the same as your exsisting ones but just 1 more plug on them which connects to the electric window motor.

the connection from the door looms to the body looms can be found by following your door looms back into the body of the car and there is 2 plugs needed to be unplugged, front are found behind the ecu (left) and opposite but same position for the right. The rear is easier still, just follow the door looms into the car when u have the front doors open and you can see where they connect from outside the car. Pull out the rubber grommet and they should be just inside.

dont get EA door looms as they have different plugs to the eb/ed and will not fit, i found out the hard and frustrating way. if your not 100% sure what car the looms are coming out of take one of your exsisting ones in and match the plugs on the ends

hope this heaps,
James

So the "8 x M6 rivet nuts part number V820134S from Ford" Are obsolete, what happens now?

go to repco. or any spares place.

or do as it did and just use 6mm bolts, nuts and washers instead. bit tricky to get them started, but work fine.

the rivet nuts are nothing special, you should be able to get them elsewhere.

Gah! Went to the local fastener place this afternoon but just missed them, shall try again in the morning! Off to bed now, im sick of seeing wires and making looms haha!

just go buy a hand full of high tensile little bolts with nuts and anti vibration washers and your done,the rivets are gay