windshield wipers not working

[macman]

my ww do not work, when i turn them on, i don't hear a sound, what dose this mean? where should i start? has anyone else ever had this problem?

[wjdunn3]

The easy place to start is at the winshield wiper motor. It is under the cowl. You may need to remove the charcol canister and/or Expansion tank from the top of the fuel tank. Very simple to do. Turn the car on and switch on the wipers using the steering column switch. Then using a voltmeter, test the wires connecting to the wiper motor. If you have voltage, then your wiper motor is bad. If you do NOT have voltage, then trace the wires back into the fuse block and steering column using ht ewiring diagrams avail on this site or in the Haynes Manual. Check that all the wire connections to the steering column are intact (connected). You need to remove the knee pad to be able to see the wire connectors at the steering column. Check the voltage there. If you still do not have any voltage then you need to remove the steering wheel and get at the switch. If I remember correctly, once you have the steering wheel off, the turn signal switch is first to be removed, then the wiper switch. If you get to this point, then I would be willing to bet that the switch is the problem. Good Luck.

[Bubba]

Hey macman,
I just had this same problem in Seattle just last week. The wiper motors rarely ever go out. As mentioned in the prior post check the motor for juice & the wiper switch. 95% of the time it's the motor locked up with gunk. You'll have to remove the gas tank, canister to get the motor out. Once you do take the motor apart & wipe all the old gunk away & lube it to hell with some WD-40, then it should work as good as new.

[JP Noonan]

Check the fuse. If it isn't blown you should still spin it or tank it out and brighten up the contacts. Like the prior post says clean up the linkage but if you need to take it out don't forget there is a rubber "stand-off" or rubber isolator that attaches the rack to behind the dash. I didn't know it was there and ended up ripping it off.

I blew out a wiper switch once because (O.K. NO ONE laugh now) I didn't realize the motor was in it's full left position when I put on my wiper arms. So the first ime I used them they wiped forward across the hood (O.K. it is funny now that I think about it). Evedently the arms didn't park right. Anyway the stress on the circut actually melted the pastic inside the switch. So tracing the flow of juice to the motors is a good idea.

BTW the fuse is a 16 and also controls the lighter and back lights.