While I have the interior and dashboard stripped out of my TR6, I decided
to take care of some of the slop in my wipers. It had gotten to the
point that, when I shut the wipers off, I would have to reach outside
and push the wiper down out of my field of view. The culprits seemed
to be the wheelboxes, that is, the part that that protrudes through the
front cowl to which you affix the wiper arms. I have wrestled with
these things before and the biggest problem is that the nut that secures
them siezes and can make removal just about impossible. The nut secures
two black plastic pieces, one on top of the cowl, and one underneath.
What I learned while re-working these things: DON'T just twist on the
nut. You will distort or destroy the tubes that interconnect the
wheelboxes. The structural integrity of the windshield wiper drive
mechanism comes form these tubes being sucurely clamped in the wheelbox
assemblies. Once you twist on the nut and distort the tube, it becomes
loose and you get the kind of lost motion I had in my system. You can remove
the black plastic cowl vent cover and use a block of wood or something to hold
the wheelbox steady while you try futilely to remove the nut.
If you have the dash and glovebox out, you can remove the little access
panels under the cowl and hold them from there. You will have to remove
these panels if you want to actually get the wheelbox out and examine or
replace it. When I finally did get the nuts to move, they galled the
threads on the wheelbox shafts, but not badly enough to warrant
replacement.
Before I removed the wiper drive cable, I marked the position of the
knurled wheels on which the wipers mount. When I re-installed the
cable, I insured that these marks were 180 degrees out so that I was
using a fresh unused portion of the wheelbox gear that meshes with the
cable. Probably not necessary because there was no evidence of
excessive wear, but it made me feel better.
When I put the evil nuts back on, I used anti-sieze grease on them so I can get
them off next time. This stuff comes in a lot of forms and I
highly recommend it for any application subject to rust, corrosion,
heat, whatever. I used it on the exhaust manifold bolts on my
salt-water boat and five years later they came out with ease!
You don't need to put a lot of torque on the nuts - just enough to clamp
the plastic pieces to the cowl. Over tightneing them will break the
plastic pieces. Don't use a socket to remove or install the nuts as it rubs on
the cowl and damages the paint. Use a 3/4 open end wrench -
carefully.
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