Stuttering Wipers

[Guest thesquirrel]

AAAARRRRGGGHHH !!!!! :(

 

My '99 (V reg) Galaxy has just started to play-up after all this time. Yesterday morning when I switched on the wipers, they rose up the screen about 25% of the way and then stopped. After about 45seconds, they rose again by another 10 degrees. Then, after another 45 seconds, they rose another 10 degrees, until eventually they were in the upright position - before beginning the descent, in the reverse steps. Again, when they were at about 25% of the way up, they dropped back into the rest position.

 

I know the steps were consistent as I spent ages sitting on the M25, watching them go through their strange routine several times. After all, what else was there to do in rush hour traffic ?

 

Has anybody else seen this odd phenominan ... phenomin ... phenom ... strange occurance, before I strip the wiper motor out and dash off down to my local Ford dealer (... not !!)

 

Cheers :)

[Guest MATT]

...i think its to do with the 'joints' seizing up, and 'rusting', if you do a search, ime sure you will find the details, but that

[Andrew T]

The problem is due to corrosion building up between the Alloy spindle casting and steel shaft of the spindle beneath the nut where the wiper bolts on. The best way is to remove the assembly and strip and grease it. However I coudn't see how to do this so I followed another suggestion. Unbolt the wipers, pop off the plastic shroud beneath them, drill a 2mm hole into the Alloy casing near top, facing the wing. Squirt in some thin oil from an aerosol with a tube while running the wipers to ensure it has spread about. In future you will be able to squirt oil in without removing the wipers. Took about 15 mins to do each side.

[Guest thesquirrel]

Thanks for all your great suggestions - if its not raining tonight (shouldn't be ...) then I'll strip them down and do the mod 'AndrewT' suggested.

 

Has anyone bought a Ford TIS from ebay - are they worth the money or are they just useless out-of-date software that won't run on Windows XP ??

 

Thanks again everybody ... I'll update the post with my success or failure ... might be of use to others ...

 

:(

[Andrew T]

This was posted last week if you get TIS it should tell you how to remove the assy, it's certainly not obvious.

[Bigjeeze]

Nutcracker

 

I would recommend the full strip down as although I did apply WD40 it didn't last long. To remove the whole wiper mechanism isn't that difficult. All you do is remove the wiper arms - then there are three bolts - one at each end by the spindles and one in the middle by the wiper motor. You also have to undo the electrical clip off the side of the motor.

 

Once you have the unit out remove the half circlip on each spindle - you can also remove the bolt on joint to the connect rod and the ball & socket joint at the other end. You can then carefully turn the spindle until if frees off and hopefully comes out of the shaft. Once it does you can clean it and apply a good waterproof grease and reassemble. Fitting is the reverse of removal. On mine I found it helped to remove the two bolts that hold the expansion tank to the battery tray so that i had some extra room.

 

If you leave it you run the real rsik of the motor burning out - and that is very very expensive.

 

Hope that helps

 

Regards

 

Gary

[Guest thesquirrel]

Thanks for everybodies help with this one ... I'm chuffed to have fixed this one myself ;)

 

If I can offer any advice, its this ...

 

(1) Dismantle and remove the whole mechanism - there are only three bolts that hold the wiper mechanism in place. I could have done the job much quicker if I'd of done this from the start, but because I started on the drivers side which is accessible, the passenger side really needs to come out.

 

(2) Take the expansion tank out, its a nuisence and it gets in the way!

 

The cause ... as described by Bigjeeze, the spindle housing is made of aluminium and the rotating shaft is nickel/chrome plated, mild steel. Once the plating wears off (as mine has) and rain water sits in the aluminium housing, corrosion sets in and the whole thing siezes up. Ford have made a pathetic attempt to add an o ring at the top of the rotating shaft, but this does bugger-all in the good old English wind and rain.

 

I also bought a 2004 Ford TIS from ebay (send me a PM if you want the details) and this proved to be very useful too - and believe it or not - it actually works on Windows XP SP2!!

 

Once again - thanks for everyone's suggestions - if I've learned one thing about the wipers on my old Gal - the whole mechanism comes out real easy ...

 

:( :( :rolleyes: :rolleyes: :( :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol:

[Andrew T]

Does the assembly come to bits, or can you withdraw the whole assembly through the narrow gap that is exposed when you remove the rubber sealing strip ?

[Guest thesquirrel]

Hi Andrew T

 

Yep, the whole assembly, including the wiper motor comes away from under the scuttle, so you can work on it much easier (or, in the shed as I did !!). Remember to pull out the wiper motor plug which is attached to the passenger side ...

 

... but consider removing the expansion tank, it makes the job a bit quicker, otherwise you have to keep twisting and pulling, to get past the tank.

 

:)

[tim-spam]

You need to remove the whole scuttle extension, as if you are changing the pollen filter - it's only held by 3 M6 bolts and is easy to remove. Removing just the rubber seal (I've never tried - does it come off?) will not give enough clearance.

[deadpool2e]

Did you have to remove the bulk head to get to the bolt? do you have to undo the exterior part of the wipers?

and is it obvious where to put the grease??

[Andrew T]

Tim,

 

By the scuttle extension do you mean the ribbed plastic section that goes between the trailing edge of the bonnet and the windscreen ?

 

(The rubber strip pulls off in seconds BTW).

[ridway]

Hi all

 

Same problem, happend in France at the start in May, seemed to clear up then came back big style last week.

 

I removed the whole wiper assembly. The wiper spindles were well and truly seized; both spindles. I felt I wasn't far from destoying them trying to drift them out. Nevertheless they came out. I spent a while cleaning them and greasing before reassembly.

 

Once re-fitted they worked absolutley fine for about 2 minutes. then stopped again, quite abruptly. This time I found that one of the connecting rods had bent slightly during my efforts to free up the mechanism. It had jammed on the the centre nut of the motor crank as it passed over it. This meant removing the unit again to straighten it.

 

The message hear is dont give up. I was in two minds as to start phoning the dealers and scrape yard after this second set back but was really pleased when I spoted the second problem.

 

Rich

[Mauser]

Please can someone explain how to remove the sodden wiper arms from the splines ?. Mine looked well seized and even after spraying releasing oil they won't budge....sob. Cannot lever up as the silly plastic cover will break. My wipers are stuttering at times and I wanted to remove and grease, maybe someone could explain these 3 bolts to me as I can see 1 either end holding the pivot arms to the bulk head and 1 holding the arms to the motor spline, but this topic mentions a third bolt holding the motor on ?, I can only see a 8mm single bolt holding what appears to be the entire mounting bracket for the wiper assembly, after taking this out it still feels solid.

Anyway biggest problem is removing the arms, am I faced with making an extractor to pull these buggers off ?.

Rather frustrated at the moment as this is the second time I have tackled this project and failed.

Cheers Simon