snamelc
Donation Time
Probably the majority of us do not venture out in the rain in our little British cars. But when we get caught in it, we want our wipers to work. The wipers on my Series II have been intermittent for the past couple of years. The last time I got caught in the rain was the last straw! I was going to get to the bottom of it or else! First, I grabbed the wiring diagram and the spare from my parts car to study what all could go wrong. I hooked a battery up to it and it didn't work either. Probably the same thing wrong with it as the one in my car. I checked every place electricity has to pass through... the wiper switch of course, the parking circuit, the thermal kick-out switch, ground, and the brushes. One brush was worn down to nothing so I fashioned a new one out of a generator brush. Still didn't run. Next I put a VOM across the contacts in the thermal kick-out switch. Open. I filed them in place. Ta da! The motor runs. And just for good measure, I filed the contacts in the park circuit. So now I'm ready to tackle the unit on the car. It's an all-day task to remove the unit from the car so I thought I'd do what I could first with it still in place. The bottom end of the motor is readily accessible so I took the bearing cap off to expose the brushes. They were in great shape. The thermal cut-out switch was next. It is mounted in the wall of the motor casing with two bent over tabs. I pulled it out and filed the points, put it back in and the motor now runs. It appears that both units had failed due to the points in the thermal cut-out switch. You can't get at the parking switch without removing the whole mechanism from the car but since all the connections are accessible from the bottom end of the motor, I think this circuit can be by-passed if it ever fails, then repaired during the off-season.
Bill
Bill
