How would you fix striped wiper arms?

[EarlyPorsche]

My wiper arms are stripped and I don't know how to fix them. I am reffering to the hole that sure be splined. I have bought a bunch of used ones also only to have to toss them in the metal recycling pile because those too are stripped. I doubt there is a fix but if anyone has one I would love to hear it.

[mackskibum]

I may be off base here, but I thought the splines were on the pivot, and the arms came with no splines- the tension of the nut on the arm is waht causes the splines from the pivot to "appear" in the hole in the arm- essentially a friction fit.

[Fleming]

I recall some years ago having the same problem. If I recall a washer was out of sequence and was holding the wiper arm away from the post so it could not complete it's friction/compression fit. Mackskibum is right, tighten the top nut and the post flutes should make an indent to the inside of the soft metal of the wiper arm.

Bob
1965 and 1967 911's

[mthomas58]

Originally posted by EarlyPorsche
My wiper arms are stripped and I don't know how to fix them. I am reffering to the hole that sure be splined. I have bought a bunch of used ones also only to have to toss them in the metal recycling pile because those too are stripped. I doubt there is a fix but if anyone has one I would love to hear it.

+1 on the washers, should keep the nut from bottoming out and will fix the problem.

[EarlyPorsche]

So tighten it more you say and I will be ok? Let me try that but my old ones that are on there have splines. The reason I am replacing the arms is because somebody decided to bend the tip of one of the arms but they did it with the wiper blade installed on it. They didn't realize that one day the wiper blade would need to be replaced as the bend will not allow removal of the blade. Pretty stupid but it happens.

[techweenie]

One caveat: I tried this years ago on a '66 I had, and it worked fine until I was in a big rainstorm for over 40 minutes, and the arm started to slip, lag, and then jammed against the other arm. Before I could switch off the wipers, smoke started pouring out of the motor.

It may not be worth the risk to try and save stripped arms.

[Paul Henninge]

Early,

No one else wants to print this on the board, but I have also had the same problem with my 1967. The shaft - the binding surface no longer provides the adequate friction...and just tightening more, may be bad for your health. What I did was a two pronged approach. First. I added shreds of steel wool in the shaft area to help the binding. Second, I used a lock washer between the nut and the aluminum wiper arm base. This was the type of lock washer with the twisted little teeth running around its' outer circumference - like a miniature version of your engine air fan...

Paul

www.solex911.com

[mthomas58]

Originally posted by mthomas58
+1 on the washers, should keep the nut from bottoming out and will fix the problem.

Simple washer like this under the nut should solve the problem.

[futuresoptions]

What I did on my 914 and Will do on my 911 if this ever happens.
I put my wiper arms on and tightened the nut, and got them situated where I wanted them (mine were stripped too) I then took a drill with a small drill bit and drilled through a hole all the way through the side of the assembly. I then placed a stainless steel cotter key through the hole
and bent it out to the sides. never had any problems with the arms slipping again. Note I used a long but skinny cotter key.

[EarlyPorsche]

Thanks guys, all good options. Futuresoption thats a great start to a solution, I may use a roll pin.

[356racing]

On my old M3 I used 3 pieces of welding wire off a mig and put them in pointing towards the sun and tightened down the nut. Never had a problem but it doesn't rain much in Phoenix.

[Porsche_monkey]

I can't see a cotter pin lasting too too long, but a roll pin, or ideally a taper pin would be a good fix.