Damned Wipers..

Mornin all!
Got a TD5 90 & the wipers have decided to play up (not work). One of those things you only find out when it rains. Anyway, Washer motor works, can hear it running so getting power to the switch. Plugged in another switch & still the same. Can hear a relay clicking behind the dash, intermitent wipe i guess but motor doesnt run.
Am i right in guessing the motor is screwed or is there a relay somewhere that might be worth looking at first?
Many thanks all!

Paxmanmerv said:

Mornin all!
Got a TD5 90 & the wipers have decided to play up (not work). One of those things you only find out when it rains. Anyway, Washer motor works, can hear it running so getting power to the switch. Plugged in another switch & still the same. Can hear a relay clicking behind the dash, intermitent wipe i guess but motor doesnt run.
Am i right in guessing the motor is screwed or is there a relay somewhere that might be worth looking at first?
Many thanks all!

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I assume it will not run on any speed?

It could be a frazzled contact on the wiper park track but usually with that you can get them to run on constant but stranger things have happened. It is not too bad to get into the motor and check it all out. Could even be a bad earth.

Not moving atall. Made a half hearted attempt & got about 1/3 the way across then it was all over. New ones aren’t to expensive so I guess it’s put a new one on & see what happens.
Funny thing is, been fine all through April!

Common problem is stiff/frozen wiper spindel's where they enter the bulkhead. If this is the case leave the switch on long enough [ not a good thing ] and the fuse will blow Do not fit a larger fuse or the loom will melt. See if you can move wipers by hand, there is usualy a bit of free play and movement should be very easy with the wiper off the screen.

Paxmanmerv said:

Not moving atall. Made a half hearted attempt & got about 1/3 the way across then it was all over. New ones aren’t to expensive so I guess it’s put a new one on & see what happens.
Funny thing is, been fine all through April!

Click to expand...

Ah some movement then - can you hear the motor straining to move? If you run the wipers with the cabin light on does it dim down quite a bit when you flick the switch (indicating a high load on the motor) the fuse of course could now have blown too - I'd check that first, then put the wipers on and go out and try and manually move them.

Hi Mate
I feel your pain. I had similar issues and basically chased them until I just decided to replace the lot. I replaced the two wiper boxes with the spindles on, the wiper cable, wiper motor, intermittent switch and relay. Now the wipers work exactly as they should. The cost wasn't too bad at all and made sense when you figure how much time it takes to take the dash off. The entire job was really straight forward. The dash comes off really easily and probably the trickiest bit is the removal and then replacement of the wiper cable. Plenty of grease is the order of the day. Took about 2 hours in total and most of that was spent putting the wipers on! Oh and don't waste any time with the spindles and that tiny grub screw, just cut them off with a grinder. Its proably not what you want to hear but honestly mate, I was chasing niggly things with the wipers and this way you just get it done in a onner. If you do replace the wiper, you will need to swap over the gearing from the old unit.

Replacing the cable is easy!
Remove the arms and push it up the tube.