What I've seen done for fixing the mirrors is not using the hex stud at all.
Find a bolt that's about the same diameter with fairly coarse threads and
use that instead. Rather than push the hex thing back in, thread the bolt
into the hole where the stud was, couple washers under the bolt head, and
tighten it down. Seems better to me than the hex thing that will just come
loose again.

Course, I learned about this after buying another mirror..

Steve
'85 westy
kent, wa

-----Original Message-----
From: Vanagon Mailing List [mailto:vanagon@GERRY.VANAGON.COM]On Behalf Of
Graham Fitter
Sent: Sunday, January 13, 2002 9:36 AM
To: vanagon@GERRY.VANAGON.COM
Subject: Does a broken mirror bring bad luck?

Hi all,

So I was driving along a while back and the mirror on the driver's door
went all floppy. Indeed, it was so floppy I had to keep the window open
and held the mirror in place until the next exit on the interstate. Then
I removed the mirror, tightened up the nut to increase the friction and
put the mirror back on the door. The mirror flopped.

Fine, I thought, and tightened up the nut even more, then the whole
thing came apart in my hands. It turns out that the bolt holding the
ball joint together isn't really a bolt, but a hexagonal stud hammered
into a hexagonal hole in the mirror mount, and held in place by
friction. If the nut is tightened too much to overcome a really floppy
mirror, the bolt is just pulled out of its hole and the whole thing
falls apart.

Not having a mirror is a really bad thing on a Massachusetts highway, so
as a last resort, I took the mirror off the passenger's door and put it
on the driver's door. The mirror is obviously a different orientation,
and doesn't fold flat against the door, but does the job just fine.

In fact, I think its better this way round - the overall backwards
visibility on the highway is much better than before - and I'm not going
to switch the mirrors over when I fix the broken one :-)

Cheers,
Graham

p.s. Has anyone had any success securing the hexagonal shaped stud in
the hexagonal shaped hole? Would glue work?

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