My much-better-half’s windshield wipers stopped working just in time the other day – which was the day a two-day snowstorm descended on our part of SW Virginia. More accurately stated, the windshield wipers in her ’05 Toyota RAV4 stopped working just as it began snowing.
The perfect time for them to stop working!
That’s what usually happens, of course – and it’s not because of the machinations of demons. What happens – as regards things like wipers – is they stop working when you need them because when you don’t need them, you don’t know they’re not working.
As often happens with electrical things, they usually just quit working in that electrical things either work or they don’t. This, by the way, is one of the main reasons why I am a carburetor guy. Carbs are mechanical things and sometimes they don’t work well but they rarely don’t work at all if they were working before. You usually get some warning that something’s not right – or that something needs adjusting. Electrical things generally give you no warning. One day, everything works as it should. The next day, they’re not working at all.
That’s what happened with the wipers.
Luckily for me, the fix was both easy and inexpensive, two desirable things that are becoming almost historical things due to what’s been happening to cars over the past roughly 10-15 years.
The replacement electric motor – the part that failed – was easy enough to find (on eBay Motors) and only cost about $70, including the shipping. Buying parts on eBay can be kind of like what Forrest Gump said about life being like a box of chocolates in that you never know what you’re going to get. But you can improve the odds of getting a part that’s comparable in quality to the part that you’re replacing by doing a little cross-comparing and reading. Check out the seller – and the brand of the part you’re buying. You’re still likely to get a part that came from Chyna – but some are better than others.
Anyhow, I got the new wiper motor for about $70 – which is dirt cheap these days for a car part. Chiefly because it is for a car that was made before ca-makers decided cost was no object (for us to pay) when it comes to parts. A headlight, as a for-instance, that used to cost $25 is now an “assembly” made of rapidly yellowing plastic that can cost several hundred bucks just for one of them.
But the real cost when it comes to the stuff made within the last 10-15 years or so is installing the new part.
You may have caught the articles I wrote a few weeks back about replacing the heater core in my ’02 Nissan pickup. The parts – new heater core and transfer tubes – only cost me about $150 and the rest was free because I did the job myself. If I’d had something newer – that required removing the dashboard and everything behind it to get at and replace that leaking heater core – I’d have probably had to pay a dealer and then it would have cost me at least $1,000 or more.
Probably more.
Same thing with what were and ought to be inexpensive repairs such as replacing a croaked wiper motor. It was not a difficult job to replace the ’05 RAV’s croaked wiper motor because it was just a matter of replacing the motor and all that entailed was removing the old one from the linkage that causes the windshield wipers to wipe. This was easily accessed by removing a plastic cover at the top of the cowl and then three – count ’em! – 10 mm bolts that hold the whole thing in place. One electrical hookup to disconnect and that’s it.
It doesn’t get much eaiser or peasier.
I mentioned what I was doing to my buddy who’s a professional mechanic with his own shop and he told me about what’s involved in replacing the wiper motors – plural – in some newer cars. It’s not just about replacing them, either. They have to be synched or flashes or mated (I forget the term) with the Hive Mind at the dealer. This means the job is going to be expensive even if the parts aren’t because you are probably not a dealer and cannot synch or flash or whatever-the-term is the new part with the old car.
It has gotten so bad in this regard that even something that used to be as simple as replacing a weak/dying battery no longer is. If you make the mistake of disconnecting the battery without connecting an external power source to the vehicle’s systems first, you may end up having to get the vehicle – you guessed it – towed to a dealer in order for the dealer to sync or flash or whatever-the-term is the new battery and shut off the electrical catalepsy the electronically vehicle goes into when you disconnect the battery without first connecting an external power source to keep the computer from going berserk. Because if you don’t, the car will probably not be drivable.
Yes, really. Don’t try it for yourself and see.
So I am grateful for the old RAV4 and my old truck. The longer I keep them, the more I like them.
. . .
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This is why the 2020 (con)Fusion will probably be the last new ride I’ll ever buy. As I’m nearing retirement, I’ll have more time to “FIDDLE” with wrenching older MAINTAINABLE rides. Just replaced the battery, can’t gripe there, got 64 months and 57K miles out of the factory original. MIDAS wanted $369 with a two-year full replacement warranty. Went to the stoned bus driver (“Otto”-Zone) and got a 3-year one for $246. Swapping it was a bit challenging (the air box top has to come out, saw the filter was marginal, walked down the street to the “Leprechaun ” (O’Reilly) and got a Wix filter for $27. The connector for the negative post, I had a devil of a time getting it to clamp properly. My #1 son suggested roughing the post and the inside of the clamp; that worked. But now I’ll carry a spare 10 mm crescent wrench in with the plastic bag in the glove box that holds the battery receipt; that’s one FLAKY arrangement! Have also located and ordered a pair of these funky terminals from Amazon, and in the bag they’ll go!
Some things have gotten better. I love and drive really old stuff. Replacing a trico vacuum wiper in a 40’s or 50’s car is a true pain in the a$$. Have to climb up under the dash and do it by braille, and then the damn thing still doesn’t work under heavy load or hard acceleration. But being able to easily access any part of a flathead engine and having it always work is still soul soothing.
It seems we’re at a civilizational engineering plateau. That is, most of the basics of the laws of nature have been pretty much mastered. Now we’re confronted with engineers that have to come up with something, anything, to justify their existence. This results in contrived complexity in the form of electronic gingerbread. It also involves coming up with ways to comply with GovCo Fatwas. I imagine the “synching” of wiper motors stems from trying to save the weight of the metal arms that used to “synch” the wipers…crude but effective.
Ask your Buddy about his computer analyzer that he got from Snap-On that has to be updated constantly. Think think about what the world would be like if your ball peen hammer went down every six months and could not be used until it got “updated”.
We think Progress is blinking lights, fancy doo-dads and electric motors but, in reality, it’s simplification of processes that were once difficult now made easier. The end user doesn’t see this because all they know is, “Hey, I push a button and watch the magic happen” without realizing the massively complex things that happen behind the curtain…things that are a b*tch to fix when they go down.
Hey Eric – when I load the page, the subtitles on your video thumbnail reads:
“Hey Everybody – Its Eric from epeados.com…. ”
Not sure if it’s automatic, but I suspect If you’re not already on a list this will probably get you on one….
Thanks for the advisory, Nasir!
I can’t do much about the subtitles, though…
‘So I am grateful for the old RAV4 and my old truck. The longer I keep them, the more I like them.’ — eric
You have identified this turn-of-the century period as the Golden Age of vehicles: when they had finally been made reliable in the 1990s for 250,000 miles of service — but BEFORE all the components got CANBUSed and synced and complexified.
I drive the same pair, a Frontier and a first-gen RAV4.
Vehicles that have to be taken to the dealer for brute-simple repairs such as battery and wiper motor replacement are UNACCEPTABLE. This should be the subject of a class-action lawsuit to punish these manufacturers and make them pay billions in damages to their victims.
Meanwhile, I shun vehicles made in the last 15 years like rat poison. Don’t have any; don’t want any. Maybe Big Gov can run a ‘Cash for CANBUS’ program and send them all to the crusher. Goodbye and good riddance!
Amen, Jim –
I tell people that if one of the big car companies gifted me a new vehicle – as they used to do 40 years ago to buy off journalists – I’d sell the mofo the next day and use some of the proceeds to buy a replacement crate engine for my truck, for when it needs it.
I’m starting to see Canbus on a lot of new motorcycles too. I wonder how maintenance will be on those and if they should be avoided.
Hi Robbie,
The last new bike I bought – my ’03 Kaw ZRX – is the last new bike I will ever buy. Because I am uninterested in a bike that is the same as every appliance on wheels. I do no want a computer or drive by wire or “safety” systems of any kind.
Canbus in my ‘18 Road King. So far so good. It did recognize the switch to LED lighting all around, no adapters needed. My buddy’s 2011 Harley spent 7 months in the shop while a determined grey beard tech sorted out why it quit running randomly. Harley home base couldn’t figure it out either. Multiple issues from an internal fractured TPS wire, to a funky O2 sensor, last replacement was the MAP sensor that was the final key to a real fix.
Hi Sparkey,
I will never go down that road! Yesterday, it was warm enough to try firing up my ancient (1983) Honda GL. And it did. Four decades-plus and the thing still starts and runs as if it had just left the dealership. And if it doesn’t? Well, is there gas? Is there spark? Is there air? That’s pretty much it. Ok, maybe check the plugs and a few other easily diagnosable (by me) parts, but that has happened I think twice in the past 20 years. No goddamn computers for me on a bike. Not ever.
I probably should have kept the ‘03 Road King, one of the last years available with a carb and no catastrophic converter nor O2 sensors. I’m out of room though so it got traded for the ‘18 Road King. The ‘18 M8 motor “out of the box” the first HD I’ve owned with gobs of power stock, those 4 valve heads really shine. A great touring bike, 6 speed transmission makes 80 MPH cruising effortless. No radio, nav, or other distractions.
Modern motorized scooter: “I get 80 miles per gallon!”
Any Harley: “I get laid”
(PS the newer HD get high 40s to low 50s MPG)
RE: getting laid, my biker bud at the gas station, goes up to the clerk to pay – her words “I’m off work at 3, come back and pick me up!” He was honorable to his wife and passed on the offer.
“My much-better-half”
Really? Does she fix YOUR wipers when they break? The simp gene is real.
Serve your master!
Cobble,
If repairing my woman’s ride makes me a simp, then I am guilty as charged.
The point is that women are not superior to men. They are not ‘much better’ than men. Why do men insist that they are?
Men built the modern world. Men created the great art, philosophy, science and technology that sustains us all. Men die in defense of women, not the other way around. Men designed and built the great automobiles and engines many of us were lucky enough to enjoy and experience.
What have women done for men? Let’s see… Prohibition, a complete fucking disaster. Equal rights, another disaster. Feminism, woke, DEI, the nanny state, ditto. Family courts, yeah.
I do stuff for my woman too. But I don’t delude myself about who is the more competent, intelligent, compassionate or productive.
Time for men to start taking credit for the amazing good that they do.
He didn’t say they were better, he said she was “his” better half. There is a clear difference.
The reason Eric is fixing her wiper motor is because he is HER better half. He’s doing the work because she can’t or won’t. That’s fine – men should help their women. But why do men find it necessary to constantly denigrate themselves in preference to women? It’s a mystery…
Ugh, this is embarrassing. Fixing her wiper motor might be the only thing Eric is better at than her. You’re making some wild assumptions absent any evidence. I don’t know either of these people, so I avoid stereotypes and generalizations.
Finally, you might consider “taking a chill pill” and recognize that the “better half” joke is as old as the hills and, in my opinion, rather harmless.
Sadly, cobble is too blinded by his anger to realize that all the trials & travails he mentioned are constructs of the Jews, aka, the Khazarian Mafia, not made up by women. Yes, women have an agenda, unquestionably, as my female doctor reminded me of today, but who gave them that (((agenda)))???
Hey Eve, try this apple, it’s great!
It’ll really open your eyes in a whole new way!!
Yes, I’m a talking snake, but nevermind that, eat this apple!!!
The Dead Sea Scrolls provided some missing info on the whole Eve thing.
Adam tells God he’s lonely. God says “I will create the perfect companion for you! Loyal, beautiful, a perfect creation”. “Wow, that’s great, I can hardly wait!”
God then tells him “However there is a sacrifice required of you, an arm or a leg – you pick”.
“Woah, arm or leg? What can I get for a rib?”
Why Star Trek’s Ferengi were awesome:
https://youtu.be/KGomS4fZ_9Q?si=ebfwbfWfwk-u2lNP
“They have to be synched or flashes or mated (I forget the term) with the Hive Mind at the dealer”
I used to own a 2019 Subaru Outback with the 3.6 motor. The windshield had circular crack and I had that fixed. To replace the entire windshield the EYESIGHT (Advanced driver assistance system) had to be “synched or flashed or mated” at the dealer. I understand that now some people are saying that the system can be reset via the dashboard controls on or near your steering wheel. I don’t know if this can be done with a windshield replacement.
I have had about 6 car windows broken on my cars through out the years. I once made the mistake of calling the insurance company and they sent out safelite. This was the rear hatch window on a minivan. The charge was $800 but I had a $500 deductible. I learned my lesson and for the next replacement I went to a local place and was charged only $300. I did not use the insurance.
Sometimes I wonder if the auto glass replacement shops send out thugs to bust out windows just to get some more business during slow periods.
Well done Eric!
Just finished up the entire front and rebuild and new front axles on the 92’ Mazda B2600i. Even replaced the burned out grain of rice bulbs in the 4×4 axle unlock switch.
String alignment done in my garage. Drives like new and it is a huge luxury to be able to tell if the front axle is locked via the switch status light.
Vintage vehicles are just so much more useful in the long haul.
“…is they stop working when you need them because when you don’t need them, you don’t know they’re not working.”
Why is my stapler empty just when I need one?
I have had numerous wiper motor problems in snow country – the wiper blade freezes to the windshield, then when turned on something breaks. And when it is snowing and cold, who the hell wants to fix it? If you live in snow country, build a large heated garage, keep the temp above freezing and your car will work much better, because in the garage everything will unfreeze, like the door jamb gasket, etc. Snow and cold is hell on cars. I finally got smart and moved out of snow country.
Amen, Jack!
A garage is a must. And so is a lift. I am forever done with lying on my back on hard concrete – or wet dirt- with a vehicle on jackstands and not being able to reach anything. Like the saying goes: I’m too old for that. Or is it that I finally got smart?
The wiper motor(s) re-sync and also the battery replacement potential fiasco is just beyond the pale.
Worst case in my ‘91 Chevy truck is I lose the radio presets. I did run a spare 12 v battery into the ‘03 Escape via the cigarette lighter prior to removing the battery. I made an adapter to do this. That way it wasn’t two trips to the battery place to return the core and avoided losing radio and computer memory. The battery place was 35 miles away since the local auto parts stores don’t carry the stock battery size for the ‘03 Escape and couldn’t be bothered to order one.
That also points up the inventory issues with the modern auto parts stores. Then they whine about losing business to Amazon and EBay.
Thanks for the tip sparky. Didn’t know you could backfeed through the cigarette lighter. If the wipers stop working on your 91 chevy wiggle the connector at the motor before you spend any $$. The circuit board that the connector plugs into is usually the problem.
Hi Ant. If the lighter works with the key out you should be able to backfeed it. On my Toyota when the key is out it disables the cigarette lighter socket. You might have to find an always live circuit in the fuse panel and go with that. Don’t forget to put inline fuses into your backfeed adapter in case something bad happens.
Yea the daughters Acura same thing. I’ve rigged a pest repeller to work off the cig lighter for the truck and the Escape, but the Acura no. Damn mice move in during the winter otherwise.
Yes it does work without key. Funny thing about my 92 pickup. It has no accessorie on the ignition switch.
Another aging Chevy truck tip – if the HVAC stops working pull the glove box liner out, look for “the big red wire”, the connector it is a part of has probably melted and cut off the juice. Cut and splice/solder the wire forget the connector, good to go again.