Yesterday after a decent sized snowstorm my son drove my truck (2003 Dodge Ram 2500) to pick up a friend. He SAYS that he lifted the wipers away from the windshield and scraped off the ice/snow, then before driving he ran the wipers for one or two swipes to brush off the remaining snow. He didn’t notice any problems.
Now, when the wipers are turned off, they don’t go all the way to the bottom of the windshield. They stop at about a 20-25 degree angle. The puzzling part is that when I turn the wipers on, they first go DOWN to the normal off position, then run through the operation cycle with the normal range of motion. But when I turn them off, they stop again in the partial up position.
Any ideas on what may be broken/misadjusted? And can I fix it myself without a trip to the dealership/parts store?
I would first remove one or both to the wiper arms from the drive spindle, to see if there is any indication that they have slipped on the spindle.
To do this you would raise the wiper arm and on the inside of where it attaches to the drive spindle you should find a small bolt or allen head that can be loosened to remove the wiper. Once you get the wiper arm off you can check to see if it has slipped on the spindle. If it has you can try to re-align the arm in the down position.
You mention that the wiper arms return to the full down position when you turn them on and go through their normal cycle but just don’t return to the fully down park position. Some wiper motors have an internal ‘stop’ bumper that can be broken or damaged. By using the wipers to clear the remaining ice and snow this stop may be damaged. I had a car where the wipers would stop in the UP postition but otherwise work fine, the internal stop in the wiper motor was broken and to fix the problem required a wiper motor replacement.
So those are my guess’, either the arms have slipped on the drive spindle or the internal park stop has been damaged.
The fact that the wipers go through the normal range of motion eliminates the possibility of any problem with the spindles. Don’t reset the arms in a different position on the spindles or they will go too low (below the base of the windshield) or too high (off the side of the windshield).
I agree that there is a problem with the park switch, and as far as I know motor replacement is the only cure.
Sounds like what happened the first time I replaced a wiper motor. It took me a few tries to get them set right.
The motor actually only goes in one direction, it cranks a rod assembly that moves the wipers (this site diagrams it quite well). If that assembly isn’t attached correctly to the motor, the wipers won’t go all the way down when turned off, but they’ll still go all the way down during the cycle.
I’d look into that first. Oh, and be extra extra careful of your windshield. In some cars, it can be very easy to crack it when trying to get at that assembly. I know from experience (and about $200 in addition to the wiper motor :smack:)
Methinks the spindle that connects the wiper motor to the wiper linkage merely slipped a tooth. Methinks this because I just solved this very problem on myowncar. It was snowing hard and suddenly the wipers stopped completely. Turned out the nut that holds the linkage to the motor spindle had fallen off and the linkage disconnected. Not thinking too deeply about the problem I just slipped the linkage back on & tightened the nut. The result was when I turned my wipers on they’d go up, all the way down, then halfway up and stop.
FIX: loosen the nut, loosen the linkage, position the wipers in the “rest” position, tighten the nut.
FWIW, it took me a couple days to wrap my head around what was going on.
Cars are fun–sometimes a 5 minute adjustment can fix mind-boggling symptoms, and sometimes you can totally F*** something up by doing what you think should be a 5 minute adjustment. (ask me what I did to the head on my '87 MR2. Go on, ask! hint: it took less than 5 minutes)
Did you know that the shafts of some cooling system bolts can corrode themselves into their holes? And when you go to remove them, you end up with a cooling system piece attached to the head by studs that won’t back out?
Well me. Thinks he didn’t do just what he claimed, and that isn’t accusing anyone of lying.
I bitch at my adult children and wife for sweeping snow with the whipper’s and that is because I am always asked to fix what they break.
However I myself have on occasion swept snow witch isn’t the always damaging but frozen to windshield blades are and that is usually caused by leaving the whipper switch on when last used.
Then too so many cars pile snow up in the hidden pockets for the parked whipper’s and is a PITA to clean out and will cause whipper’s to stall when they should park.
I do check my whipper switch prior to starting my truck and am puzzled as to why systems don’t automatically default to off when vehicle is shut down???
And by the “he SAYS” tells me you question also. :dubious:
