VCCA Home Forums TECHNICAL - 1945 AND NEWER 1965-1970 Window regulator - rings?

Wow... what an education.

I'm fixing my vent window regulators on my '66 Corvette. I picked up new ones at Paragon in Michigan during the Flint Meet. They have 3 rings on the shaft. I didn't think anything about it.

Finally, last week, I took my driver's door panel off and removed the regulator. Installed the new one. Reassembled everything. Ooops the handle now sticks out too far!!?!?!?!?!


So I called Paragon... It seems that there are THREE different regulators and the ones called for in most books, MAY, or MAY NOT, be correct. The three different regulators are marked by rings... one ring, two rings, or three rings. And they are about 1/8" different lengths.

So I looked at my drivers door regulator --- it had ONE RING.
Took the passenger door off -- it had TWO RINGS.
Looked at the NEW replacement regulator and it had THREE RINGS.

IS there any way that I can blame this on my wife?

i've been under the impression there were 4 different vent window regulators used during the c-2 builds. suggest ya send the long shaft regulator back to Paragon and have your original regulator rebuilt. mike

Can you grind off the proper amount of additional length and then still have the handle clip into place?

don't think there would be enough spline to engage the window crank handle's clip. mike

Didn't know if they were designed to be universal and cut to what was needed or three different shafts identified by number of rings so assembly line workers could select the one needed more quickly. With different number of rings on driver's side versus passenger side it suggests that may have been the case.

Yep, as I said, "it's been a real education".

Here's what I found. Only the shaft lengths are different.

• One Ring = 1 3/8" long
• Two Rings = 1 3/4" long
• Three Rings = 1 5/8" long

And, to give kudos, Paragon has gladly agreed to replace the mechanism with any other one that I want. They were very good about it, and the fact that it was 3 years ago, didn't faze them...

The other stuff that I'm finding is convertibles and hardtops are different (ie. differnt lengths), and there appears to be a difference even within a single year and body style, depending upon which interior was chosen. I noticed that most reproduction door panels seem to have a raised edge around the handles which would require a longer shaft.

Picture: Original on the left, replacement (per the book) on the right.