Has anyone tried heating the mirror carefully with a heat gun?  That's how I
get adhesives to release.

Stuart

-----Original Message-----
From: Vanagon Mailing List [mailto:vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com] On Behalf Of
Alistair Bell
Sent: Wednesday, January 28, 2015 6:33 PM
To: vanagon@GERRY.VANAGON.COM
Subject: Re: Power mirror replacement

Nick,

Hats off to you getting this done. I made an exploratory attempt and gave
up. I didn't think of using solvent to release the glass from the backing,
well done.

Alistair

> On Jan 28, 2015, at 1:52 PM, Nick Feickert <thesuperflydisco@GMAIL.COM>
wrote:
>
> So, I have a set of power mirrors that I'm gonna install on my 85 Westy.
> O bought a switch off of Samba. I also ordered new mirror glass from
> GoWesty. So after reading about the options of replacing the glass, of
> which most say just stick it over the old glass. Well, ok if you don't
> plan to wire them up. But I figured that if I want the mirrors to
> defrost properly, one pain of glass has to be better than trying to
> defrost through 2 pains of glass....right? So the adventure of
> removing the glass from the passenger side was underway. Changing a
> transmission would have been easier!! How I did it without losing a
> drop of blood I don't know but I did finally succeed!! The process: I
> started with a set of small screwdrivers and a bottle of Goo Gone.
> Cudos to anyone that can do this without busting up the mirror. I
> carefully wedged the screwdrivers between the frame and glass til I
> had a small gap. I then would squirt some Goo Gone to help release the
> very sticky adhesive hold the mirror on. As I worked my way around, I
> had to be careful to seperate the metal contacts from the back of the
> mirror which are the defrosting elements. Be careful as this is in 2
> pieces seperated by 3 little silicon rectangles down the middle. I
> almost lost one which would short out the defroster. Even as I got
> down to the last couple tiny chunks of glass, it was still a SOB!! But
> finally I got it and cleaned up the metal plated with Goo Gone to clean up
any left over residue.
> Phewww!! One down, one to go. Do not attempt if you have no patience!!!
> Peace,  Nick