jdm mirrors/mabuchi motor replacement

INFORMATION G2IC Archives
1

If anyone has jdm mirrors and is having problems, this is the motor for replacement:
FK-280PA/SA

http://www.mabuchi-motor.co.jp/cgi-bin/catalog/e_catalog.cgi?CAT_ID=fk_280pasa

I’m not sure if it’s the PA or SA yet.

My motors are shot for sure. The one I have out sticks, but runs if I turn the worm gear on the shaft. If I run it by itself, it starts to smoke a bit.

The company is based in Japan, but has American office in Troy Michigan. Anyone familiar with the company?

I’ll be calling on Monday to find out about ordering some, hopefully they sell to individuals and not just businesses.

And if anyone cares…If your mirrors don’t work, a lot can be done to fix them. Cleaning/changing parts. The only real problem would be if the rubber belt inside snapped.

There are two components inside, one looks like a highwattage diode, the other a capacitor, but when checking them, neither have the right properties of these types of components.

If anyone has more technical info to add on jdm mirrors(besides hooking them up) please do.

2

archivethis

3

how did ya figure out that was the motor? used in the jdm mirrors

4

Awesome info. How did you get the mirror apart? I know the base comes off, but haven’t gotten any further than that, cause my mirrors are working and didn’t want to screw them up.

5

I once helped a friend fix his mirror on a civic(not jdm…), and we took the chance of pulling off the mirror. That’s how you do it.

To be sure it was the same, I looked with a flashlight and it was the same. There’s a center ball, and two gears. One gear is at the bottom the other on the side, which are for up/down, left/right.

There’s always a chance the you could snap the balls at the end of the worm gears, but unlikely unless they are very brittle.

You pull from the outside, getting your fingers under the mirror. Initially you don’t pull too hard, just enough to extend the gear all the way out, you’ll here it jumping/clicking. Try not to flex the mirror. The trick is to pull strong but slow, and be gentle…if that makes sense.

I haven’t put the mirror back on, but it wasn’t difficult on the civic. In any case, I have the lenses from my CDN mirrors if I break one.

I’ll try to get some pictures.

After staying up half the night installing the drivers side, and it not working because the motor was not strong enough(it worked once fully, then just kept giving up 1/4 way), I decided to take apart the passenger side one, and test it with my power supply.
Taking the cover off was a bit tough, two clips and one screw. But it also has two guide retainers connected at the base that makes it feel that there is something still holding it. Just wiggle it up at it comes off. You need to remove the old silicon seal.
I thought I was doing something wrong for a while since I couldn’t even get the motor going at first. But I was putting 12volts right to the contacts of the motor and it still didn’t budge. So I took the motor out and like I said before, by spinning the shaft the motor finally worked.

The only writing on the motor is the company name. The model is one of the 3 variations of the FK-280PA/SA model. I’m still working on finding the exact one, but all 3 should work, just at different rpms. I may just get the fastest and strongest one, 280pa-20150.

I’ve found a few companies who make the same model or slight variations of it, so I should be able to get one of them to sell in small quantities.

The following page describes what the digits mean in the model number. I’ve found most japanese motor companies use this standard:

http://www.telstar-tech.com.tw/Product/eve-01.htm

scroll down to DC micro motor coding system.

This has consumed me for the past 24 hours. Hopefully I will let it go till Monday.

6

Well here are some pictures, you know the drill with imagestation…refresh or cutandpaste:

http://www.imagestation.com/picture/sraid117/p9cfe1598da007a976ff2f481f6dd06e4/f893e2e1.jpg
http://www.imagestation.com/picture/sraid117/p9cfe1598da007a976ff2f481f6dd06e4/f893e2e1.jpg.orig.jpg

http://www.imagestation.com/picture/sraid117/p6d0060e010353e9106bc95a3616b6e8d/f893e2d6.jpg
http://www.imagestation.com/picture/sraid117/p6d0060e010353e9106bc95a3616b6e8d/f893e2d6.jpg.orig.jpg

http://www.imagestation.com/picture/sraid117/p4535a7776b312740b0371645b92020f0/f893e2cc.jpg
http://www.imagestation.com/picture/sraid117/p4535a7776b312740b0371645b92020f0/f893e2cc.jpg.orig.jpg

http://www.imagestation.com/picture/sraid117/paecca3ea1865871ff6b713e696046554/f893e2d3.jpg
http://www.imagestation.com/picture/sraid117/paecca3ea1865871ff6b713e696046554/f893e2d3.jpg.orig.jpg

http://www.imagestation.com/picture/sraid117/p08654a2e7ada1fdb0127bd3b57527bf1/f893e2dc.jpg
http://www.imagestation.com/picture/sraid117/p08654a2e7ada1fdb0127bd3b57527bf1/f893e2dc.jpg.orig.jpg

7

In the last 2 pics you can see where the motor is supposed to be. On top the U-shaped notch is where the worm gear sits.

The base of the spring loaded shaft of the rotating arm has bearings. It needed to be greased. I put rust check in there.

I’ll probably take it all apart except for the large spring assembly-it seems to be under alot of pressure and I may not be able to put it back together easily.

8

my motors work fine, but it seems as though the track sticks halfway through the retracting motion. i’m wondering if replacing the motors will solve this problem.

9

If your motor is fine, then the other possibilities are that the bearings need lubrication. But you have to open the mirrors for that. It’s the only thing I can think of that would make it slow half way. The rest of the gears may need grease, but wouldn’t slow the mirror halfway. If needed, they would make the mirror slower throughout the whole range.

I’ll be ordering motors today, and have them by the end of next week.

10

ordered 2 models from Jameco.

UC-280s-20145 and UC-280S-19160.

I took apart the motor last night, and unwound the wire from one of the armatures. I counted 165.

So most likely the original motor is FK-280PA/SA-18165.

The 18XXX is the diameter of the wire. SInce I couldn’t measure that small, I counted the windings. which is shown as XX165. The larger the wire, the less the windings.

Also, the larger the wire, the less torque it seems to have.

I’ll keep everyone informed of how it goes. The motors were 2.55US each.

11

good thread :up:

12

they actually stick halfway through the motion, and only sometimes. the passenger side is worse than the driver side. sometimes they’re both smooth even. its not a major problem, it seems more like a physical problem with the rotation track than anything with the motor.

13

lubing the bearings would probably help. Before I did it, I had to use pliiers to fold the mirrors, that is when I had the inner assembly out of the mirror casing. Now I can use my hands.

Your motors can be a little weak due to this, and are having trouble with the increased friction. With time they will get worse, but don’t hassle with taking them apart unless you have to. If these motors work, maybe just stock 2 or 3 till the day you may need them.

14

Also, the worm gear is pressed on to a knarled shaft. I’ll do my best to get it off, but in the mean time I’m looking for a source for the worm gears too.

I used to work in converting speedo’s from KM to Miles, and for the Ford trucks we used to just change the worm gears. One of them looked obout the same thread as the honda one. I’ll find out tommorow. The only problem is they are plastic.

15

Well my mirrors work now!

About 4 seconds to turn in/out.
The motors I used were NICHIBO UC-280S-20145 10000rpm motors. I also tried UC-280S-19160 9000RPM, but used the first ones because they were about 1 second faster and have more torque.
I ordered them from Jameco Electronics in Cali. www.jameco.com.

15$ US for 6 motors- 3 of each kind. Paid 12.30$ US for UPS standard shipping, 18$ CDN in brokerage fees and 4$CDN in taxes.

Hint- even though regular post is 6 bucks more-and a week longer- I beleive the brokerage fees are included.

Total for 6 motors: 22.60$US + 22$CDN = ~37$US

I will have pics soon with write up for install.

Also for Montreal people - Don’t use UPS!!! I am tired of dealing with this company. I tell them to hold for pick-up, and they tell me it’s ready for pick-up. I go, and I’m told no it’s not ready, but it is flagged for pickup…come back tommorow. The next morning I check the net, and it says OUT FOR DELIVERY!! I call, and ask why it’s been sent out, and she tries to tell me that sometimes it can happen, and they’ll try to contact the driver to put it aside for pickup. I waited an extra day before trying to pick it up, but in the mean time it finally showed 24hours later on the internet tracking that customer would pick up. It showed up at 2:30pm, same time the driver tried to deliver it the previous day-I think the driver came a second time, saw the note I left saying don’t deliver again, I will pick-up, and he marked it for pick-up. If I didn’t leave that note, I’d still be without my motors, 6 days after they arrived in Montreal.
It seems UPS is good at getting it to your door, but if your not there, good luck in picking it up! That’s my experience. And I have horror stories from many other people. FED-EX or postal to Montreal.

Sorry for rant.

16

wow guys, excellent thread.

i believe my motors are bad, does anyone else have a problem with the motors clicking when they come in(maybe like a couple broken gears or so). like they start to come in then they will stop, click, pop out a couple mm, then come in. sometimes they do it once, sometimes none, sometimes twice. it happens when it goes in and out, so its not the direction.

Think its the motor? hope its just that. now that i have a replacement motor to put in

-Francisco

17

yup I got the same problem

18

yup, the motor is the problem

or

yup you need to know too?

19

It’s not the motor that makes the clicking, it comes from the large spring mechanism seen in one of the pics. I believe from not being able to rotate properly due to bad motor the mirror will “skip” and make the noise.

Is it the same loud click that you can make if you move the mirrors manually? What helps is lubing the bearing ring at the bottom of this spring. As you turn the triangle plate at the bottom, the bearings will expose themselves. I sprayed rust check in there.

The mirrors are quiet except when the pass. closes. You can here the gears louder. It’s not the motor but the gears enclosed in the white housing, which I didn’t open. One may be misaligned or something. But they both open/close perfect with no struggle.

One thing I notice though. No “Objects in mirror…” on pass. side. Took me some time to figure out why I couldn’t get my drivers side mirror to point out further. Does anyone know if US mirror plate fits on JDM? I will try later this week.

20

I keep posting…

Main differences of motor.

Rated for 6-12V, 12V nominal- instead of 9-15V, 12V nominal.

Tabs are on top, not on back. Make sure to solder wires as flat as possible due to lack of available space at top of housing.

Motor is slightly taller due to plastic tab between pos. and neg., about 1.5 milimeters. When you put housing back on, it will be tighter fit to hook tabs at bottom of housing, but still do-able. Housing will bulge a bit at top where motor is.

Original shaft is not narled, just smooth. Easy to get worm gear off. I’ll post picture of how to.

In my pics you’ll notice that the two wires switch position on motor, I got them mixed up. So for reference, black is positive, yellow negative. If they are reversed, mirror will turn 90 degrees the oppasite way-folding out instead of in.