Replacing a 99-02 Power Pontiac Grand Am Mirror
My sister knocked her mirror off on my gate. She has a Pontiac Grand AM GT, and it is surprising how easily it snapped off. She had to go, and I didn't have time to figure out how to detach it, so I wrapped it in a diaper to protect the paint. It seemed like a good idea at the time:
It turns out that the mirror is pretty easy to find. It sticks out quite a ways, and I imagine this happens a lot. If this does happen to you, the diaper idea is probably more difficult then just popping off the corner panel and unplugging the mirror. Here is a view of the broken mirror:
Here is a picture of the new mirror. The foam covers the entire inside, while the original mirror had less coverage, but thicker foam:
To replace the mirrir, pop off the inside corner cover:
Down in the door panel, there is a connector for the power plug:
It turns out that the nuts are 10mm. I assumed US cars were standard still. I suppose I'm too used to working on a 40 year old US car, and it took me quite awhile to find the socket. Having to use a metric socket on a US car gave me the same feeling I get when I accidentally put my wife's smaller socks on my feet. Don't get me wrong, I've fixed my share of Toyotas, Volkswagens, and Datsuns, it just seemed weird on a Pontiac. Here is the mirror all installed:
Notice how the paint is kind of scratched up? Well, I kind of thought my brother-in-law might remove the mirror. The hanging mirror-in-diaper did some damage. :(
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