I had mine done agood while ago replace motorand all the gubbins in the end, now no problems, sometimes I think having the wiper motor on intermittant wipe does not contribute the eventual siezure, as someone commented it is a bad design in the first place as everone suffers from this problem eventually, good luck to anyone who carries out this repair cheers from Colin Audi A4 B6 2.5tdi avant love it and take care of it.
Slow wiper mechanism repair
- Thread starter quattrojames
- Start date
I'm sorry, but Photobucket have by their own admission lost ALL my pictures, so pretty much all my guides are now defunct.
It's ok though, they've offered me a years "Ad-Free" membership to make up for the years of hard work that went into these guides.
It's ok though, they've offered me a years "Ad-Free" membership to make up for the years of hard work that went into these guides.
Followed this guide today, thanks very much it was extremely helpful. The lack of photo's didn't hurt things to much as the text was so detailed, but I took a few pics as we went to help
Pics started once the wipers were already removed as that's all pretty self explanatory, as well as the area covers etc.
Time to get removing the scuttle tray everyone mentions
These are the 3 clips mentioned
We had turned the car into the sun so the plastic was warmed up, and my friend painted on a strong degreaser/cleaner to get into the notch. We left this to soak for 5 minutes and then pulled from the center as advised by a previous member. It came out no problem at all and then we with worked our way out, first to the passenger side, and then to the drivers. It all came out without a hitch or breakages of glass or plastic - I think we got lucky.
We removed the top ECU cover seen on the pic above on the left, and then unclipped the ECU securing band. I didn't take pics, but all of this is self explanatory.
I then removed the 3 bolts to the wiper assembly so it was loose, you need to do this to be able to remove the ECU box lower tray.
The Linkage is now loose and the ECU free to be moved about
The lower tray is held down by 3 nuts, undo these, the front is an 8mm and the rears 10mm iirc
You now have a choice, you can slide the tray over the cable going into the car and push it back out of the way like this...
...or you can disconnect the wiring that goes through that tray and take the opportunity to clean up the area and check the seal properly. I did the latter because my other reason for doing this job was I am getting water into my drivers footwell, and Google suggests this lower ECU tray seal is a common cause.
The wiring connector plugs are bit of a ****, each plug is held down by two catches. I'd image there is a useful tool to remove this which I don't own; I had to use a small flathead screwdriver to push them out a little, one at a time and lift the plugs free; there is also an earth wire held on using a 10mm captive nut. With these out of the way you can withdraw the lower ecu tray completely and remove any crud, plus check the condition of the seal. You should probably renew the seal, but I didn't have one so I elected to use some auto silicone sealant instead and reseal the old seal on both sides when refitting the lower tray.
Afterwards you can clean the bulkhead ready for refitting later (note I'd removed the linkage already when I took this pic in case you're confused)
With that done it was time to look at the linkage itself. As suggested you have to wiggle it about a bit after disconnecting the motor plug, but it does come out. I didn't need to disconnect any of the linkage bars, but then I had made the area nice and open having removed the tray and wiring
The offending item
Following the instructions will have you remove the c clip, washers and knock out the spindle. In my case I did this before they had seized up completely so removing them wasn't too hard, and they actually moved fairly easily. Nothing that couldn't be improved though, mine looked like this once removed
Clean off with emery paper on the spinde and inside the casing and then lubricate with lithium grease or similar
They fit together smoothly even before the grease, no rubbing. I packed as much grease in as I could and reassembled.
I didn't take any further photo's as reassembly is the reverse and it's all self explanatory. As said above it takes about 3 hours.
My wipers were faster afterwards, but only a little, maybe the motor is a bit tired on mine after all these years. Regardless it wipes well and I had to go into that area to re-seal the lower ECU tray so it would have made no sense to have only done the seal and left the wiper linkage untouched, mine wasn't seized up completely, but it was in need of some TLC.
Hope this helps
Pics started once the wipers were already removed as that's all pretty self explanatory, as well as the area covers etc.
Time to get removing the scuttle tray everyone mentions
These are the 3 clips mentioned
We had turned the car into the sun so the plastic was warmed up, and my friend painted on a strong degreaser/cleaner to get into the notch. We left this to soak for 5 minutes and then pulled from the center as advised by a previous member. It came out no problem at all and then we with worked our way out, first to the passenger side, and then to the drivers. It all came out without a hitch or breakages of glass or plastic - I think we got lucky.
We removed the top ECU cover seen on the pic above on the left, and then unclipped the ECU securing band. I didn't take pics, but all of this is self explanatory.
I then removed the 3 bolts to the wiper assembly so it was loose, you need to do this to be able to remove the ECU box lower tray.
The Linkage is now loose and the ECU free to be moved about
The lower tray is held down by 3 nuts, undo these, the front is an 8mm and the rears 10mm iirc
You now have a choice, you can slide the tray over the cable going into the car and push it back out of the way like this...
...or you can disconnect the wiring that goes through that tray and take the opportunity to clean up the area and check the seal properly. I did the latter because my other reason for doing this job was I am getting water into my drivers footwell, and Google suggests this lower ECU tray seal is a common cause.
The wiring connector plugs are bit of a ****, each plug is held down by two catches. I'd image there is a useful tool to remove this which I don't own; I had to use a small flathead screwdriver to push them out a little, one at a time and lift the plugs free; there is also an earth wire held on using a 10mm captive nut. With these out of the way you can withdraw the lower ecu tray completely and remove any crud, plus check the condition of the seal. You should probably renew the seal, but I didn't have one so I elected to use some auto silicone sealant instead and reseal the old seal on both sides when refitting the lower tray.
Afterwards you can clean the bulkhead ready for refitting later (note I'd removed the linkage already when I took this pic in case you're confused)
With that done it was time to look at the linkage itself. As suggested you have to wiggle it about a bit after disconnecting the motor plug, but it does come out. I didn't need to disconnect any of the linkage bars, but then I had made the area nice and open having removed the tray and wiring
The offending item
Following the instructions will have you remove the c clip, washers and knock out the spindle. In my case I did this before they had seized up completely so removing them wasn't too hard, and they actually moved fairly easily. Nothing that couldn't be improved though, mine looked like this once removed
Clean off with emery paper on the spinde and inside the casing and then lubricate with lithium grease or similar
They fit together smoothly even before the grease, no rubbing. I packed as much grease in as I could and reassembled.
I didn't take any further photo's as reassembly is the reverse and it's all self explanatory. As said above it takes about 3 hours.
My wipers were faster afterwards, but only a little, maybe the motor is a bit tired on mine after all these years. Regardless it wipes well and I had to go into that area to re-seal the lower ECU tray so it would have made no sense to have only done the seal and left the wiper linkage untouched, mine wasn't seized up completely, but it was in need of some TLC.
Hope this helps
Nice write up Stonedofmoo ....
Unfortunately mine snapped the metal bracket in 2. Had to replace the whole thing...
