Working Man's Burbon

[LockDoc]

Originally Posted by HO455

Fortunately I'm still limber enough to reach around and roll the 4th door window down at a stop light. However the 3rd door window has gotten so stiff when I tried to lower it last week I thought I would break something so I gave up. It's nice to get that 4-40 air conditioning. I guess it's time to take it apart for cleaning and lubrication.

Makes you wonder how things like that can start having problems for no reason at all.....

[HO455]

Originally Posted by LockDoc

Makes you wonder how things like that can start having problems for no reason at all.....

Being that it's NW Oregon I'm betting it's moss growing in the window channel .

By the way did you get my email?

[LockDoc]

Originally Posted by HO455

Being that it's NW Oregon I'm betting it's moss growing in the window channel .

By the way did you get my email?

Thanks for the reminder on the eMail. I hadn't checked it for a few days.
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[HO455]

First off. Thanks for the help Leon.

Now on to the task at hand. The wiper motor currently in the WMB been giving signs it's on its last leg. Basically it's slower and louder than ever. So I picked up some used ones hoping to find a good one. After testing I found I had a nice running unit but, the problem was that it had a badly rusted shaft. (Photo #1) There's no way any seal installed on the shaft on the left would ever keep water away from the bearing.

So pulled it apart as well as one unit I had that didn't run. That one had a good shaft but a broken brush on the armature. Perfect candidate to donate a good shaft.

Disassembly involved drilling out the factory rivets on the gear box. Once apart it I noticed a marked difference in grease application when they were assembled. (Photo #2) After some cleaning and reapplying grease it was almost ready to reassemble. Prior to assembly the park contacts needed attention so I used a ignition point file to clean and dress the park contacts. (Arrow points to the park contacts in photo #3.) Unfortunately the photo of the cleaned contacts didn't come out.

To reassemble the gear box I used pop rivets. On the rivet that holds the ground strap I scraped all the old paint away before installing. In addition I put a backing washer on the rivet (Photo #4 see arrow) as well as coating the rivet and ground strap with copper seize to ensure long-term conductivity.

I found the pop rivet backing washers at a yard sale a couple years back. I never knew they were an actual thing even though I had used washers on pop rivets before.

Anyway the unit has tested good and a new seal ordered, and then for me to pull the current wiper motor.

[LockDoc]

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Good job! That will be better than any aftermarket motor.
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[HO455]

Originally Posted by LockDoc

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Good job! That will be better than any aftermarket motor.
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That's my hope.

[HO455]

I did some work on my backup lights yesterday in hopes of increasing the light output. It has become very apparent how poor the backup lights on the WMB are since I been driving my new S10 Blazer to work on the weekends. It's a night and day difference between the two trucks.

After removing the lens it's easy to see why the light output is so poor. (Photo #1). I had lined the taillight and front turn signal housings with butyl aluminum sealing tape as part of getting the Burban road ready years ago but obviously forgot to do anything with the backup light housings.

Since most new cars have a reflector built in around the bulb I decided to do the same for the WMB. I picked up a pair of used 6v lantern battery flashlights for $2 at the Rebuilding Center (I love that place!). I stripped the reflectors out of them and dove in.

Carefully holding the gasket I traced the inside edge of the gasket on to the reflector. Then I did a rough cut of the tracing followed by a test fitting. I repeated that process half a dozen more times before I got a nice close fit. Then I used a Dremel to open up the hole for the bulb and snapped the reflector in place. Between the bulb and the close fit there was no need to glue the reflector in place. I should have got a picture of the reflector installed without the light on. I will get that photo when I do the other side. I only did one side as I wasn't sure how well it would work. But now it's done it I'll be doing the other side for sure as the light output is much better than I expected it to be.

[HO455]

Back 10 months ago you may remember I overhauled a wiper motor for the WMB since the one in it was really getting slow. I know it's hard to believe that the wipers could go slower but, I was noticing that I was using high speed more and more. And on cold days, before the truck cab warmed up the delay wiper function the wipers would pause mid-wipe and it would take a second pulse to finish the stroke. Once the wiper motor got warmed up it would work properly.

Fast forward 10 months and once again here in PDX we've been living with our annual, snowpocalypse, crisis warnings for a week now. I put the snow tires on and threw a shovel in the Burban just to be prepared for whatever happens. And all was well until i was leaving work Saturday when I discovered the wipers had finally quit working completely. Ugg..

I knew this day was a coming but, there always seemed to be something more urgent on the to do list. Fortunately it was barely sprinkling outside and I made it home without issue. The next morning though, I had to make a stressful decision!

Drive the truck with studded tires and no wipers or drive the truck with wipers and unstudded Firestone Indy 500's? They're a great tire except when they're cold. Then they are slippery. Hummmm...

In the end working wipers won the vote and fortunately the weather guessers missed their snow/ice predictions and the commute was safely completed. Whew!

So guess what I did yesterday?

It dry and about 40 degrees outside. With enough humidity to make you aware it was cold. The wiper motor replacement pretty much as expected. Annoying but not aggravating!

I went to my buddy Karl's house and he helped with removing and installing the cowl piece. I did learn first hand how effective the vent screens I installed under the cowl are working. Yes, there was a lot of small bits but no pine needles which is good as they can really plug the fenders drains.

Once the cowl was removed I removed the wiper drive arm. Then i partly removed the bezel so I was able to access the wiper mounting bolts and fish the motor out. It took a bit of struggling to scrape the old gookum putty off the underside of the dash. (Photo #2). That laying under the dash kind of joy.

Unfortunately in my rush to get over to my buddies house I forgot to grab the new seal for the shaft, which could have been a real screw up but, fortunately the old seal wasn't too bad. I vaguely remember replacing it back when the truck was in the body shop.

The seal had a small piece missing on the outside edge but, the inside was in good shape, so I greased the inside and put a bit of #2 Permatex sealant on the outer edge where it fit on to the wiper motor. Both to make up for the missing piece and to prevent the seal from spinning with the shaft of the wiper motor. On the old motor the seal was spinning with the shaft and polishing the wiper housing. I really don't know how it's supposed to work but, spinning with the shaft seems wrong to me.

After putting some new putty on the motor housing to keep the water out of the cab and a bit of copper seize on the bolts to ensure they ground well. (Only one bolt grounds the motor but, after I had the motor in place I couldn't remember which one was the ground so they all got copper seize). I positioned the motor and bolted it in place. After inspecting the area in the cowl to see if it looked like the new putty would keep the water out I reassembled everything and tested it..

Whoo Hooo! Now the wipers were faster on a dry windshield than they were before on a wet one. Or that's the way it looked to me. And this morning it was sprinkling out and the delay function worked as it should even when the wiper motor was cold!

Oh man what a luxury that is.

The only issue at present is why did it take me 10 months to replace it?

[LockDoc]

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I was hoping to hear you say that you had checked the wiper transmissions while you had them unhooked to make sure that there was no binding in them. That was my issue when I had slow wipers. I had to remove the transmissions and get them freed up before my wipers worked like they should.

Glad to hear you got them fixed....