The Stovebolt Site Forums The Shop Area General Truck Talk wiper repair

I am just getting ready to open up my wiper motor and want to know what I am in for. Cleaned off 50+ years of grime and wondering what is the best tool to use to remove the unusual fastners...not sure what they are called. Can anyone walk me through this?

I'm assuming that it's the vacume unit?

If you are referring to clutch head screws, screw drivers and driver-bits are available from many sources: NAPA, Harbor Freight, McMaster-Carr, and most reproduction parts vendors in the Links section.

You can often successfully use a flat-blade screwdriver, but use a blade that tightly fits into the head.

Tim

Tim,
These are not clutch head screws. They are not screws at all...more of a bolt with a thin raised rectangle shape area that you have to grab on to un-fasten. I ended up using a pair of needle nose pliers to take them off. I will take a picture later today and post it.

Now that I have the cover off, what do I need to do to try and get this working better.It had some old, thick grease/lube in it inside. I cleaned/removed all of that.What new type of lube does it need? Where can I get a new gasket?

Here are a couple of pages with a half dozen pictures of the motor when it is disassembled. The paddle or piston is a woven fabric that is impregnated with something that I haven’t been able to figure out what it is. Maybe graphite or maybe rubber, but it is the most critical part of the motor and it is what wears out and causes a vacuum leak. A vacuum device or system CANNOT have any leakage or it simply will not work properly. The system must be vacuum tight at all points, you can check this by using a hand vacuum pump.
http://www.pbase.com/dennygraham/ad_interior&page=2
http://www.pbase.com/dennygraham/ad_interior&page=3

The Special Screws:
http://www.pbase.com/dennygraham/image/118637544
I first loosen them with a pair of un-serrated duck-billed pliers that I have and I drilled out a piece of round stock and flattened the sides in a vice to fit the shape to spin them out the rest of the way.
You cannot get parts or gaskets for the Trico motors so use a lot of care when you separate the parts to save the original gaskets. About all you can do by taking the motor apart is to clean it up and re-lube the piston. Use white grease to lube the piston and don’t over do it.

I see that while I was typing this, that you have in all likelihood spoiled the gaskets so In the end, if you really want the motor to work as it did when it was new then spend the money and send it in to the only show in town, i.e., Ficken Wiper Service http://www.wiperman.com/ they bought up all of the Trico parts in the country long ago and are the only ones that have the parts to rebuild the motors. And before someone asks, no, they do not sell parts, they only rebuild the motors.
Denny Graham
Sandwich, IL

Well Denny I thought you might know about this. Mine was a mess inside with big globs of goo which probably had something to do with the wipers only going a quarter of the way before stopping.

As usual, I was heavy handed and ripped the gasket in the same place on top and bottom. I remembered that Flicken had bought up all the old stock after that.

Oh well. I'm not sure if I will send this off and get repaired or just go the new replacement electric route.

Thanks for your help.

Well if you're not to hung up on originality in the long run that's probably the way to go. I never paid much attention but do they make the electric wipers for 6v systems or have you converted over to 12v already?
DG

12v

Jim Carter has 6v and 12v wipers for 47-55 trucks. I assume they are different - I say this because years ago I bought a 6v unit from The Truck Shop and it was a 12v unit. When I called them, they said it would work fine. I sent it back because they also incorrectly maintained their 54/55 unit would work with an original radio - it would not (no one sells a 6v or 12v electric wiper that works with a 54/55 Chevy truck factory radio/speaker).

I'll use RainX on the windshield and a Ficken rebuild and/or a dual-action fuel pump. The 4+ hour rides to/from Macungie this past Spring were very interesting - it was raining coming and going. The standard vacuum wiper was fine but I wish the heck I had hooked up my heater/defroster.

Tim

I don't really drive that much in the rain, not because of the wipers but because of the pain of getting to the barn to park my truck ( soupy slick clay soil )

I will probably ship it off to the wiper man and rainx the windshield and be done with it.

Chuck

LMC has electric kits for about $150

I'm sure you will be happy with the job Friken does with your motor, just make sure you install a new vaccum line and that the system is absolutely vacuum tight. And while they have the motor pull the transmissions and restore them.
I've used Rain-X when I thought I might get caught in the rain and it do work. And even though my vacuum wiper motor and transmissions have been restored and work just find (as long as you are running at a steady 35 mph and don’t accelerate) I’m still gonna install the dual action fuel pump when I finish the engine rebuild this winter.
DG

The business portion of a vacuum wiper is the leather seal. I have several NOS , and good used sets for my truck. I thought I had everything worked out by using some Kroil and getting everything cleaned up and working correctly. It did for a couple of years but then they became sluggish again. After some research, I came upon the notion of using neets foot oil for the "business" end of the wipers. After having done this this past Spring, My wipers have never worked better. Neets foot oil is from cow hooves and comes in Natural or Synthetic versions. It doesn't matter to your wipers. It might matter to your Italian loafers!

I thought that the piston (paddle) was leather also at first, but if you look into it a little further I think you will find that it's really a woven fabric that is impregnated with something which I haven't been able to figure out. I thought it might be some thing compounded with graphite but just don't know fo shure.
You say you have NOS paddles? I'd like to see a picture of that if you cnn manage it. I was almost 100% sure that Friken had cornered the market years ago. I've never seen any NOS parts for the Trico motors.
Denny Graham
Sandwich, IL

Oh, and I ran across this: "Neatsfoot oil is a yellow oil rendered and purified from the shin bones and feet (but not the hooves) of cattle. "Neat" in the oil's name comes from an old name for cattle. Today, many[who?] consider the best quality neatsfoot oil to be that which comes from the legs of calves, with no other oils added."