Basically.. stopped working.. and i am wondering if anyone else has had this happen. We had some snow and cold weather so the Z has been sitting. Today i went and got all the ice off the windshield and defrosted the windshield and wipers. Now when i hit my wipers to on, only the passenger one goes on.. the other one wont move.. I noticed when i open and close my hood the wiper is sitting a little higher, and gets pushed down by the hood..

I checked and the spring is still in there..

I can push the windshield wiper down so it sits normal, but when i let go it goes back up.

Any help would be great.. i live in Washington where is rains quite a bit...

Thanks in advance guys!

**edit** and there is no snow or ice blocking the wiper from moving.. the car ran for 25 minutes and all the ice melted off..

 

or does anybody have a service/repair manual they could send me that would explain the windshield wiper set up and how to get to the "internals" or the system

 

http://www.flsportingnews.com/zwiki/Service:Index

This should have the information somewhere; but I am almost positive you need to replace the motor...

 

is there two separate motors? one for each side? My passenger side one works..

 

a. The wiper assembly fits on the motor shaft. The motor turns, but since there are no ridges on the shaft, the wiper stays in place.

or

b. You need a new wiper motor.

 

Meaning that maybe i just need to push the wiper back onto it further... it does seem a little "floppy"

 

Any updates on this? I just got the same problem today. I noticed that you move the driver side wiper freely by hand. You shouldn't be able to do this.

I think whatever gear/linkage that connects to the motor for the driver side wiper is broken and sheered off. The passenger side works fine so I believe the motor is okay.

Can someone please suggest what I can do? I'm thinking about opening up the car to see what I can do.

It's raining and I'd like to get this fixed asap.

Thanks for your help.

 

There is only one motor.

The motor has link that attaches to the passenger side.
Another link that attaches from the passenger side to the drivers side.

My guess is that the link going from the passenger side to the drivers side has come loose (bolt worked itself off or something) and the link is disconnected.

Take the wipers off buy popping the cap off, holding the arm and taking the 10mm bolt out and pulling the little base straight off (it is easier if you lift the wiper off the glass). Each side is different so don't mix them up.
Now pull up the plastic, it should be quite obvious at that point where things have gone wrong. Once you get it all worked out, run the wipers to make sure nothing is binding and they park in the proper position when you shut them off.
Assemble in reverse. When you go to put the arms back on, the stock glass has little marks to tell you where they should park at. To move the position, you need to pull them off the post and move the position and press them back down again. DO NOT try to move them on the post, you may strip the splines.
Once they look right, put the bolts and caps back on and test them.

Chris

 

Thanks for the reply. While I was trying to take things apart, I saw the nut right underneath the cap for the wiper arm loose.... WTF!!! it's loose.

From what I can see it's not a very good design. The nut presses the wiper arm onto a tapered spindle. The nut itself is not secure by a cotter pin or anything to keep it from loosening and turning.

Anyways, I'm glad that the problem was as simple as retightening the nut.
I still think it's bad design. You need a locking mechanism - an extra nut, or a pin or whatever.

Oh well, I'm glad I'll be safe in this rainy weather.

 

Have you tried tightening the nut that holds the arm on ? Or actually, removing the nut and arm, inspecting it and all linkages, then reinstalling

 

OOPS ---I didnt see #9---Either way....always start at the beginning

 

No problem. Thanks for your response though. I think I just needed some pointers to start. I wasn't there what I could take off without braking since so many parts were plastic. I found a manual online which pointed to the arm attachment and the plastic cap that you can take off.

It was at night and dark... I didn't notice the cap until I saw it in the manual.

 

I know that this is 10 yrs later, but the info on this site has helped me tremendously. My problem was the passenger side wiper. Thanks to this thread, it was an all too easy fix. I only had to tighten the nut holding the wiper arm. The arm went back down and it moves now. Thanks for the update.

 

Welcome and good on ya for doing a search on your wiper problem. There's very little that hasn't been covered on this board, and a little research goes a long way.

 

ABSOLUTELY THE answer. One of the great simple fixes I have been pleased to find.