Front wipers and washer jets question

[sentinel_uk]

Hi all.

Now the weather is as cold as it is (-6 today) I am having a few problems.

When I go out and start my car in the morning, I find my wipers don't work for a while then all of a sudden they come to life.

Also, my water pumps for wiper seem to be frozen.
I can't hear the pump at all, but after a while they seem to wake up, then are fine from there on. the wipers are not stuck to the glass. Sometime I have driven 50 miles befor I can use jets.

I don't thing I have the heated jets on my Sri but I thought I would still hear the pump working.

Anyone got anything I can check out to fix it?
Getting a little bit of a pain having to keep pulling over to clean road spray from windshield as wipers just smear it.

Thanks

[Graham]

Think its just down to the fluid being frozen in the bottle. Need to empty it out when dethawed and replenish with the correct winter strengh.

The reason they work after a drive is that the engine has warmed up and allowed the radiant heat from the block to dethaw the washer fluid.

[Derek Mc]

The washer reservoir is way out in front just inside the bumper, hence the filler pipe at the headlight, so it has to have a strong anti-freeze in it to stop windchill freezing it tight as a duck's bottie. Also explains why you don't really hear the pump.

As for the wipers it is always kinder to ensure they are not ice welded to the glass screen as it is quite easy to burn out the wiper motor and controllers in this weather. Happened on my wifes golf last winter very expensively.

[matt450]

Hi mate my wipers did that in the winter not work for a couple of minutes. It was about a couple of weeks later the wiper motor went from not working on intermitit then not working on number 1 then to not working at all. Then I had to replace it dealer charge me £80 for a new one but I did fit it myself easy enough

[masterjohnson]

Hi mate my wipers did that in the winter not work for a couple of minutes. It was about a couple of weeks later the wiper motor went from not working on intermitit then not working on number 1 then to not working at all. Then I had to replace it dealer charge me £80 for a new one but I did fit it myself easy enough

Two areas to look at:
1. Where the wiper arm attaches to the post.
2. Trasmission (arms that connect each post to wiper motor) This is under the Metal/Plastic in front of the windshield.

It's a good idea and practice to wipe the snow away from the wipers and make sure they are free (not frozen to the windshield) before turning them on if you read careful this was already mentioned.

for your washers/ windshield washer reservoir i dont know the remedy for that. with freezing temperature i dont really think anti freeze will do the trick.

[sentinel_uk]

i had a full antifreeze winter mix in there, and as its been so cold, i added a little extra to be on the safe side.

The jets themself froze the drops on the outside over the jets, once the spray worked and i think maybe inside the jets themselves.
Need to get heated ones i think.

The wipers seem to be fine all year round apart from in the winter and the cold hits.
Did this to me last year as well. Something must be freezing on there.

Like i said in other post, the blades are free of the windsheild as i clear all the ice off by hand first and make sure there not stuck to it
Anyway, i have topped it up again with some more neat anti freeze ontop of the mix that was already in there. Will see how that goes.

As for the wiper motor, Do they run on any relays for the timers? Could they be freezing if there in the engine bay?

[Tony W]

Does putting antifreeze in the windscreen washer bottle = damaged paintwork, trim, rubber & the like????
Thought it was a higher ratio of windscreen washer concentrate to water to prevent it freezing....upto a neat (100%) solution of pure concentrate for extremely low temperatures...
Cheers

[dh.dti]

you deffo don't want to be putting coolant anti freeze in lol...

a neat solution of good quality screen wash is the way forward

[sentinel_uk]

Took it all apart, my motor was full of water and on the pcb board inside, were the brushes are, the tags that hold them down had rusted away, But interestingly enough, i did notice that someone had had it apart before and tried to repair one of the tags that hold the brushes onto the board by soldering what looked like a piece of tin to the bottom of one of the brushes housing then bending it round the pcb.
Really not impressed, But i guess the person who had the car before me had problems with it and did a temp repair.
I was very very lucky as i got a motor of another vectra from a scrap yard that had been rear ended... HARD. Ouch, but most of the front end was ok, so i grabbed a few bits and replaced my washer motor and also my fog lamps as the lenses had cracked. Sadly the engine had already been taken and most of the inside of the car had also gone.
I still may do the heated wiper jets, but once i had changed the motor over, even though it was freezing, i was able to use my jets once again.