Wipers

The windscreen wipers on my 1989 have stopped working. At first it was a bit of an intermittent fault. The wipers would on occasion stop mid way through the sweep and continue a couple of seconds later but they have suddenly stopped altogether. I have a hunch that it is the switch. I wanted to change it anyway since the vehicle has very recently been treated to a rebuild and the rubber boot of the switch is looking horrible but how do I go about testing it? What else can go wrong apart from the switch or motor?

Was the motor stopping or have the teeth on the shaft worn so it's not gripping the wiper arm properly?

Col

Under the nearside (left hand) bulkhead shelf, next to the door, you will find the wiper motor with four wirs to it.
The Black one is earth, grounded through the motor clamp, so make sure that that is a good contact.
IIRC the Green is a permanent feed to the park switch, and the Red/Light Green and the Brown/Light Green are for the speed and delay.
A multimeter shoulkd tell you if you have a feed to each of them.
You should be able to see the end of a shaft, secured by a circlip. If the circlip isn't there, that is probably the cause of your problem, as the gear wheel disengages itself at random periods, so fit a new circlip and more than likely problem solved.
If you are feeling adverturous, you can remove the motor and give it a good clean-up inside, remembering to regrease the wheel and spindle.

Thanks oldseadog. Will give it a shot. I still think the switch is at fault though. I guess I should be able to hear some whirring sound if the motor is working no?

The motor is just the motor, and if it turns, then it's generally OK.
However, the motor relies on the gear wheel to push, pull and park the operating cable.
If the gearwheel does not fully engage all the time, you will find the symptoms you describe.
Good luck.

If there is no noise [easy to hear as is in the cab] then you have an electrical problem. Switch contacts poor may be one of them. The switch is an open item, remove covers and have a look at the state of the contacts.
As Oldseadog says worn gears can stop the system and if for long enough the fuse will blow. DO NOT go and fit a larger fuse as some do, the result is a melted loom.

I have changed the switch to no avail so I bought a new wiper motor. Before removing the old one i switched plugs from the old one to the new one and the new one started working as soon as I turned the key. I'm not sure whether the wiper switch was on or off! To be totally sure, I plugged the old one in again and darn it, it worked. However, there must be a loose connection of some sort. There are 2 wires with connectors on them. One goes to earth and the other one goes into the multiplug. When I touched the connector of the latter one to the body of the motor, the motor worked. So I am guessing that it is an earth problem. I just cannot make my mind up what to do next!

It'll be the bulkhead earth, always the earth .

doriz said:

It'll be the bulkhead earth, always the earth .

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It is an earth problem 100% but it is not the wire that is attached to the bulkhead. It is one of the wires coming from somewhere towards the driver's side and going into the multiplug. For reasons I cannot understand, this wire has an uninsulated male and female slider connector connected to it and the wipers work when this connector is touched to earth.

reiny said:

It is an earth problem 100% but it is not the wire that is attached to the bulkhead. It is one of the wires coming from somewhere towards the driver's side and going into the multiplug. For reasons I cannot understand, this wire has an uninsulated male and female slider connector connected to it and the wipers work when this connector is touched to earth.

Click to expand...

Previous owners wiring skills?

Sorted. I piggy backed another wire into the one that needed to be earthed and that was that.

reiny said:

Sorted. I piggy backed another wire into the one that needed to be earthed and that was that.

Click to expand...

Defenders and earths