I’m almost obsessive when it comes to controlling windshield wipers to their ideal speed, meaning they run when just enough rain is covering the windshield. Often this means speeding them up when I’m driving fast or on a highway, and slowing them down when I’m sitting at a red light. Do any cars have a mechanism that links the windshield wiper frequency to the speed the car is going? If not, why? It seems like such an obvious feature to have and surely I’m not the only one who’s as this anal about their wiper speed…
Mine does. You can manually set the sensitivity, or how much water accumulation is required to activate the wipers, but the frequency and speed varies automatically with speed.
The wipers will activate infrequently when you’re sitting at a light (once every ten seconds or so), and will pick up in frequency as you drive off. It’s pretty slick and works quite well.
Have you ever used RainX? As long as you’re going more then 40 or 50 miles an hour you often don’t even need to use your wipers…Though it does take some getting used to since the rain travels up your windshield.
I’m pretty sure our Audi A6 (2007 model) does this too, though I admit I haven’t read the specs. I know that it sure seems like they slow down when you slow the car down or stop and vice versa.
If the rain sensing is well enough tuned it should probably provide this behaviour without the need for additional speed input. As you drive faster the amount of rain accumulating on the glass will increase, and the wipers run faster anyway. My Lexus is250 seems to behave much this way, although it may indeed have some additional speed input.
IMHO rain sensing wipers are the best thing since sliced bread. No speed sensing feature on the ones on my car, they strictly go by how sensitive I have set them and the amount of water on the windshield.
more water accumulates = more wipes.
A large sploosh = high speed until clear.
light rain = wipe as needed,
Stop raining = no wipes.
My Citroen C5 (2002 model) has rain sensing and speed sensitive wipers.
The rain sensor closes any windows left open if it starts to rain and no-one is in the car.
And my radio gets louder when I drive faster! All by itself! My mirrror dims itself when someone has their high beams on behind me, too. And my windows lower a little when I open the car doors, and then when I shut them, they close for the most snuggest fit! I pretty much sit inside and it drives itself. Well, all except for the shifting part.
I always think it’s funny that I have every automatic doo-hickey but opted for a stick shift.
Infiniti G35 Coupe.
Related question to justify this post: Are the speed sensors for the wipers actually sensing speed or are they adjusting for moisture accumulation (which increased with speed)?
Speed sensing is silly. A design like that would be using vehicle speed as a proxy for what you really care about, quantity of water on the windshield. And as Rick outlined, there are lots of reasons why vehicle speed is a crappy proxy for water quantity / rainfall intensity.
The electronics for a rain sensor are no more or less expensive than those for a hookup to a speedometer.
I also bet that not a single one of the people upthread who said they have this feature really have a wiper controller which follows their speedometer. They have wiper controllers with rain sensors.
My Hyundai Santa Fe does this. If I have the intermittent wipers on, when I get up to about 40mph, it will automatically kick up the wiper speed a notch.
My mirrror dims itself when someone has their high beams on behind me, too. And my windows lower a little when I open the car doors, and then when I shut them, they close for the most snuggest fit! I pretty much sit inside and it drives itself. Well, all except for the shifting part.