Air powered wipers stuck

[two.fiveM35]

The red button on my air powered wiper motor is pushed and and I can not get it out. Any idea on how to get it to come out or am I up the creek and need a new one?

 

[Big Dumb Truck]

I hate my air powered wipers and plan on getting electric ones. I have gotten my wipers to work perfectly only to have them act up the next time I turned them on. They are so out of here.

 

[TexAndy]

It is possible to fix them. No guarantees on staying fixed.

I had one that was acting like that, where the arm would go to one side and stay there. If I recall correctly, I took it off the truck, and ran compressed air through it in both directions with tool oil. Dunno what that did exactly, but it worked again after that.

 

[cjcottrill]

I carefully disassembled mine, cleaned everything up, and coated with a light coat of waterproof grease. They work good as new. Be carful with the gasket, it is fragile.

 

[Big Dumb Truck]

One of mine is at least 3 time faster than the other. It goes so fast that the arm keeps coming loose.

 

[TexAndy]

I should take one apart and see what the gasket looks like. I'll bet it would be trivial to cut new ones on my laser, once I've made a drawing for it.

 

[Big Dumb Truck]

I cleaned mine inside and out with WD-40. It only helped for a few minutes. Not a good fix.

 

[cjcottrill]

I have seen repair kits for some of them, I think it is the same one used on some of the older civilian cars.

 

[cjcottrill]

Grease is a better choice. Sometimes the old grease gets hard. A good clean up and fresh grease usually does the trick.

 

[topo]

There is some good information if you do a search . I put each wiper on its own supply line and valve. Larger trucks had air wipers for a long time and seals get dry. You make a simple filter out of a 3/8 pipe collar with rope fiber in side to keep crud out.

 

[Flyingvan911]

I held my finger over the air outlet and turned the wiper by hand. That popped the button out. Then I replaced it with a metal wiper motor.

 

[two.fiveM35]

I held my finger over the air outlet and turned the wiper by hand. That popped the button out. Then I replaced it with a metal wiper motor.

Thanks for the tip, I'll give it a try. I bought a cheap plastic replacement and hooked up a air hose from the shop compressor (80psi) and blew the end off and almost got me in the nuts. **** it hurt.

 

[two.fiveM35]

Any suggestions on lube/grease?

 

[cjcottrill]

I don't know what everyone else uses, I use plumbers stem grease.

 

[rustystud]

Any suggestions on lube/grease?

The best grease to use is "Super Lube" synthetic lubricant. It will not dry out and water will not wash it out. Almost all of our air-wipers need to be serviced. The leather seals dry out. After servicing mine they run like brand new units.

 

[donnerwetter58]

After cleaning and lubing my old metal units, they worked for a short period of time. They had excessive blow by of the seals. I disassembled them again and found the coiled spring seal expanders were just iron oxide. I replaced the springs with an o-ring of similar cross section. This did the trick. The seals are expanded to the cylinder walls and the blow by is gone. Have not had a failure since. I just need to do the second one to match now.

 

[rustystud]

After cleaning and lubing my old metal units, they worked for a short period of time. They had excessive blow by of the seals. I disassembled them again and found the coiled spring seal expanders were just iron oxide. I replaced the springs with an o-ring of similar cross section. This did the trick. The seals are expanded to the cylinder walls and the blow by is gone. Have not had a failure since. I just need to do the second one to match now.

Now that is "thinking out of the box !" I'll have to remember that little trick.

 

[frank8003]

Look in here

http://www.steelsoldiers.com/showthread.php?56882-Plastic-air-wiper-motors-repair-how-to

It should be a sticky