Slow Wipers

[Ringmaster]

Folks,

I hope you and yours are well.... Some advice please...

The windscreen wipers on my C3 are much slower than they should be. I suspect the problem may be due to the motor having lost lubrication after 34 years.

Is there a way I can get some lubrication into the motor's mechanism without dismantling the whole wiper assembly?

[John.]

Might be an idea to disconnect the linkage at the motor to confirm it is the motor and not just the linkage.
Not sure what it'll be like on your car but on B3 it's not a big job to pull out the whole lot and overhaul?

[tractor Dave]

And might be spindles (under where wiper arm connects). Water ingress causes corrosion and they seize up.

[Ringmaster]

Applied WD40 liberally to every joint, bolt, spindle, etc and left to soak in for a couple of weeks.

This seems to have improved things considerably.......

[droopsnoot]

I've just had a similar issue on one of my old Vauxhalls, and while I took the wiper assembly out to swap the motor for a more modern one which runs more quickly at a lower current, I suspect some of the improvement was from lubricating the linkage.

[Hanuman]

From what I've seen of the quattro (I can't think what the V8s are like right now) there is sufficient slop in much of the linkage that this alone is likely sapping the energy. Loose joints may sound easy to turn, but as the load is applied, some effort is spent twisting bits out of alignment, which equates to more effort required. Offload, the motor seems fine, but when loaded, it slows down markedly
It's my personal observation and supposition, but it likely explains why the wipers also seem to have free spots, and slow spots through their travel.

The main place being at the wiper arms themselves, where you can feel the play in the housing.

[msh]

Originally Posted by Ringmaster

Folks,

I hope you and yours are well.... Some advice please...

The windscreen wipers on my C3 are much slower than they should be. I suspect the problem may be due to the motor having lost lubrication after 34 years.

Is there a way I can get some lubrication into the motor's mechanism without dismantling the whole wiper assembly?

What is the reason for this requirement - lazyness, or some asshole having welded some stuff on top of the wiper assembly?

I haven't had a need to deal with C series wipers, but I've dealt with quite a few A [golfs] and B series wiper mechanisms - it's more or less straightforward to take them apart and grease properly. And while spindles of wiper arms actually are more prone of sticking, due to containing very small amount of grease right from the start, grease in reduction gearing of the motor itself of your wipers now for certain resembles some kind of glue more than grease, and has been in that condition for at least 10 years. So don't hesitate - it's just removal of the wiper arms, removal of the mech itself, then pry off the links, undo the motor - spindles itself must be held in place with circlips, opening the reduction gearing just takes to undo the hooks don't hesitate to remove the big gear of reduction gearing, it contains a lot of old grease underneath - while there, also clean the contacts for the position sensing. I also usually take apart the motor itself; if rotor is being held in place, casing can be removed to add small amount of grease at the end bushing. I usually use lithium EP2 grease for various stuff like this.

Actually you can be lucky that old wiper assemblies have made better than new ones - unlike in 80's cars, where the usual problem is as you described, in B5/mk4 cars the wiper spindles usually manage to get stuck - what happens next, I guess, depends on luck or persistence of the user - I've seen both stuck spindles [once I had to fix such a mech] and wiper assembly where frame has been broken in half by the torque of the motor after one spindle has got stuck.

[BackintheFold]

What MSH says is top advice.
Taking the motor out and apart for cleaning/regreasing is simple enough and makes a big difference.
I also had to do it on my B2 and my A3 (2006) rear wiper.

[Ringmaster]

One of these days I will tackle it, but I am pleased with the result so far...