Dangerous Wiper incident.

[Kit 105]

I’ll cut to the chase, the drivers side wiper failed in the fast lane of the M11 during a heavy downpour. Not fun and thankfully it was easy to pull over.
 

Annoyingly the wiper assembly was fitted from my donor car as my old one had worn so was hitting the bonnet and the A-Pilar (though it never failed), seemed sensible to swap them over as the donor seemed normal.

 

The left side is fine and it’s wiping range looks normal, the drivers side now moves about 2cm up and down at the correct time but that’s about it. I got out a few times at the lights and wiped it manually, it moves freely.

 

Could it have been fitted wrongly? Oddly my rear wiper stopped working recently too, the fuse seemed a bit brown on the teeth when I inspected it (the rear has its own fuse), I replaced it and the spray worked a few times but no sign from the motor, then it all stopped working again. Something is perhaps shorting it out?
 

I’ve recently swapped engines (and ecu’s), could this have any effect on the above or is just a coincidence?  

 

Guess I will need a new linkage arm and hopefully not a new wiper motor.

 

Thanks

 

Kit  

Edited December 19, 2020 by Kit

[Kit 105]

It was the bloody nut holding the wiper down.

 

Will keep an eye on it incase it comes loose over time again. 
 

Oddly now it doesn’t work on normal wiper speed, intermittent, and fast work. Seems another coincidence that there’s another failure in the system. 

 

The rear wiper is getting power but not moving, guessing that’s a motor issue.

 

If it’s not one thing it’s another.

Edited December 20, 2020 by Kit

[KitsonRis 154]

This happened to mine while doing a lap on the Nurburgring back in August, luckly it was the passenger side and I was close to the end. I also panicked thinking it had failed but was just the nut had come loose. I need to sort out the linkage as I have got the standard hitting bonnet - as an intrim fix I have put foam pads on the wiper arms and also don't use it in the rain.

Edited December 20, 2020 by KitsonRis

[Machinehead 198]

luck it was just loose - there is a part of the mechanism that can fail but iirc it is replaceable - its 15 years since I had mine fail and cant remember exactly what the part was but I do remember its a faff getting at it!

[stevenc3828 165]

Rear Tailgate wiring needs to be repaired I'd say for the wiper

[Kit 105]

4 minutes ago, stevenc3828 said:

Rear Tailgate wiring needs to be repaired I'd say for the wiper

Had that done at expense this summer. Even the spray was working. It’s getting power but nothing from the motor (even hit it with a hammer but nothing), so guessing it needs replacing. Just odd all this stuff has happened soon after swapping the engine.

[cornershop 37]

I experienced similar recently, but it wa my passgenger wiper that stopped - that too was a loose nut.

I bought the linkage bush kit below as Cotswold advise the full linkage is NLA.

Not fitted yet, a project for warmer climes...

https://www.bimmerforums.com/forum/showthread.php?2366083-BMW-E31-E32-E34-E39-Wiper-Linkage-Repair-Set

[Loadmaster 945]

Sympathise here, wiper failures in the rain can be really scary (obviously!).

 

Happened to my first E39 at motorway speed coming down the M40 from Coventry, but luckily the traffic was light - thing is, my wife was driving the car and I wasn't even in it. She'd only driven it a handful of times in the whole nine years I'd owned it and she wasn't happy!

 

It was a wiper relay switch failure.  

[Kit 105]

1 hour ago, Loadmaster said:

Sympathise here, wiper failures in the rain can be really scary (obviously!).

 

Happened to my first E39 at motorway speed coming down the M40 from Coventry, but luckily the traffic was light - thing is, my wife was driving the car and I wasn't even in it. She'd only driven it a handful of times in the whole nine years I'd owned it and she wasn't happy!

 

It was a wiper relay switch failure.  

Funny you say that. After stopping safely the first thing I thought was thank god the misses wasn’t with me, another reason for her to tell me why her Mk8 Honda Civic is better than all my cars. 
 

I decided to tell her it was an ‘interesting journey’ when I got home and left it at that!

[Blackman 150]

Same thing here, had the nut become loose on the driver's wiper arm few years ago, but mind you, it was kind of my fault really, as I probably didn't tighten it properly after changing the arm, so can't blame anyone.

 

I think I just noticed that it wasn't cleaning the screen properly and went out to have a quick look at it, then realised it was all wobbly, so just checked/tightened the nut and that the end of it - no drama, slow rain, city traffic, got home and fixed it.

 

If anyone's interested, I fitted an E36 wiper arm to the driver's side, getting rid of the "reverse hook" wiper arm of the E34, so now I can just buy any 24" wiper blades and they are a direct fit - no messing around with special adapters for the reverse hook.

[The Spooner 95]

I discovered that even if the nut is tightened, the splines on the arm can still be too worn! Had this a few years ago on the passenger side - was a loose nut that wore the spline down - a new arm later and all was well 

[KitsonRis 154]

On 26/12/2020 at 11:41, Blackman said:

If anyone's interested, I fitted an E36 wiper arm to the driver's side, getting rid of the "reverse hook" wiper arm of the E34, so now I can just buy any 24" wiper blades and they are a direct fit - no messing around with special adapters for the reverse hook.

Doesn't that only work if the arm is that non-driven one though? As I was about to knick my step dads E36 one that he had when I was looking for wiper arms and blades a few years back but my drivers arm is a pinch bolt thing which iirc is the high pressure/speed one? So it didn't fit.

Edited December 27, 2020 by KitsonRis

[Blackman 150]

5 hours ago, KitsonRis said:

Doesn't that only work if the arm is that non-driven one though? As I was about to knick my step dads E36 one that he had when I was looking for wiper arms and blades a few years back but my drivers arm is a pinch bolt thing which iirc is the high pressure/speed one? So it didn't fit.

 

The fitment may be different on racks that have high pressure system on them, so it might not work, but if you have a regular wiper rack, then it's just a straight swap and fits perfectly fine.