Windscreen wipers stuck on
 

Hi all

The windscreen wipers are now stuck on, having been intermittently on. Moving the wiper lever around, the wipers continue at normal speed in all positions, except high-speed where it goes to high speed. I was able to stall the wipers when I held the wiper switch between positions. I take the wiper's fuse out when it's not raining.

Given that I can switch the wipers off if I hold the lever in between positions - would this not indicate that the switch is the problem?

Is this a familiar story to anyone? I haven't been able to check this out because I'm having trouble finding time to work on the car when it's not wet or windy at the moment.

Thanks

Can you remove the shroud and spray some contact cleaner into/onto the track? It might be as simple a fix as that.

If not you're looking at electrical issues/gremlins which is definitely a dry-weather job.

And Jim - I can do you a s/h replacement wiper switch arm if needed!

Good luck either way

Nick

Hi all

Just to conclude this...

It's fixed - water in the intermittent wiper relay.

Using these wiring diagrams...
https://cleanflametrap.com/wiper.html
I tested the wiper stalk, off the vehicle, which checked out ok.

At this point it seemed that the problem was either the parking switch (making the wipers stop in rest position), or, the relays which are to do with the 'intermittent' wiper setting.

I took the lid off the wiper motor gear section - looking for connectors triggered by cams, but they were under a large nylon gear, so I made a new gasket and put the lid back on.

Then I pulled up the passenger side carpet and got the two relays out (which are - for a 92 - a black one for main wipers, yellow for rear (estate) wiper.

The black relay, which was mounted downwards, had water dribbling out of it. It's been a wet winter and there's a bit of moisture around that footwell.

I dried it, resoldered and tested the unit, replaced one capacitor which was rotten, and it now works fine.

The yellow relay wasn't soaking in water, but there were also some water damaged components.

I put some silicon grease on the circuit boards as a moisture barrier, and drilled small drain holes in the bottom of the relay boxes, because they are back where they were and facing downwards.

I have to say - usually on a Volvo 240 (particularly a late one) everything is well engineered, well placed, easy to work on, and glitches ironed out. But having those relays so low in the car and somewhere where they can trap water is not great when there's plenty of room up behind the dash. Then again - they survived 28 years.

Thanks
John