Forester side mirror: cover replaceable?

[Charles Packer]

The plastic cover for the side mirror assembly -- mine got smashed.
The mirror and electric adjuster are fine.
On inspection of what remains in place, it looks like the cover is
held on
with snaps. So can these remans be pried off and a new cover
snapped on? My local Subaru dealer sells only the complete mirror
assembly. There are hints online that the cover can be obtained.
from China, but the Web site in question is kind of odd and hard
to navigate. I put in a request there for more information. Anybody
here have information on this?

 

[.._..]

I might suggest calling around to junkyards instead.

 

[piks11]

The plastic cover for the side mirror assembly -- mine got smashed.
The mirror and electric adjuster are fine.
On inspection of what remains in place, it looks like the cover is
held on
with snaps. So can these remans be pried off and a new cover
snapped on?  My local Subaru dealer sells only the complete mirror
assembly. There are hints online that the cover can be obtained.
from China, but the Web site in question is kind of odd and hard
to navigate. I put in a request there for more information. Anybody
here have information on this?

How much did the dealer want for the whole assembly?

The reason I ask is that we carry kayaks on the roof of my 2001
Forrester and in loading and unloading the kayaks the mirror covers on
both sides ended up broken. My girlfriend thought replacement mirrors
would make a nice Christmas gift for me, but she said the dealer parts
price was something like $425 each for the complete assembly. Could
that possibly be right? Surly not. We had no luck at all finding the
part from junk yards either locally or online.

Anyhow we repaired the damage for $2.85 per mirror using muffler
clamps and covering them with black duct tape. That was a couple of
years ago. Now if the kayaks fall they just bounce off the mirrors.