Windshield wiper motor

Of course the wiper motor is toast on my newly purchased 48 Panel.
I have wanted a Panel forever, don't know much about them.
How are people fixing them?
What are you using to convert to electric?
Thank you David.

I converted to a 2 speed electric easy swap

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Where did you get the motor and how did you attach to the tension cables?

I got it from willys america it bolts inplace of the vacume motor no messing woth the cable

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Not a pic of mine but i can get one if you want this was from a google search just same one i have

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With the Electric motor conversion you still use the original cables under the dash . I would imagine all the Willys suppliers carry them. Mine is just a single speed and it is slow. I wonder how much faster the two speed is.

We have what appears to be the same conversion from Kaiser Willys , with no way to attach the cables!
Just the threaded
drive post.

The cables are on the inside of the cab up under the dashboard. Changing the motor does not have anything to do with the cables. If you look under the dash and you're cables are not there you have another issue. Good luck

more info

There is a part that fastens to the firewall that the cables hook to that is not a part of the vacc. wiper motor. It has the T slot that the vacc. motor goes into. The new electric motor hooks up to this using the T slot and screws to the firewall. Without this part the electric or vacc. motor will not hook to the cables. Sorry I don't have pics but maybe someone else on the forum does have some. Good luck!! Sorry I just noticed you have an FC and I am not familiar with how the wipers work on them. I was speaking about wagons and trucks, and how they work. They may be not be the same as an FC.

I have electric wipers too, but here's the beef: the wiper blades themselves. Mine are brand new, and they sort of float over the glass (yes, i've bent the arm a bit to add more pressure). With the 10" wiper blade, I might get 4' of actual wiped surface (that I can see out of), but the rest is distorted by the water. In snow, it's even worse (and my defroster works great). How do you guys run your Willys in rain or snow and actually see out of the windshield?

SanJuanDigger said:

I have electric wipers too, but here's the beef: the wiper blades themselves. Mine are brand new, and they sort of float over the glass (yes, i've bent the arm a bit to add more pressure). With the 10" wiper blade, I might get 4' of actual wiped surface (that I can see out of), but the rest is distorted by the water. In snow, it's even worse (and my defroster works great). How do you guys run your Willys in rain or snow and actually see out of the windshield?

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I noticed that the spring on wiper arms is THE smallest weakest little spring I've ever seen on a wiper arm...
In the short run (two years now...) I removed the spring -- cut a coil or two and reinstalled. Restored tension on the arms giving very good results even at hwy speeds in light snow!

Ok on my 51 truck ...I purchased a 2 speed electric wiper motor kit for a 50's Ford pickup the kit had motor, switch, harness, mounting plate ,whole 9 yards as shown .........on the back you will see it has the exact same coupler that is on the firewall ..........this connector is virtually the exact same size and shape as the one for the vaccum motor. this connector was just a hair too big to fit inside the stock coupler on the firewall.
I thought ok no problem simply swap coupler..from Vac motor over to electric.....Yeah right!...different shaft diameter ..no dice!

so what i wound up doing was to Very Very carefully use a dremel tool to open up the stock firewall coupler couple thousanths of an inch just enough to get the connector to press fit into the stock coupler on the firewall ..........then had a bit of unexpected suprise it just so happens the holes in the mounting plate exactly line up with the stock mounting holes in the firewall and stock coupler....How bout that..!!
Then it was a simple matter of locating the switch and running the wires to it and hooking everything up. and there you have it ...in less then 15 mins i had working 2 speed electric wipers. now before all this i took the underdash directional pulleys and cleaned and lubed them up whne i reinsatlled them i left the tension nut tiny bit loose so the cables will self adjust for cable stretch......Not that i will ever need to use the wipers .....as i live in PHX AZ...Rain ...What's That??....
Just last weekend at the Car show it TRIED to Rain....Tried ...but in Vain ....spit and sputtered and wound up just enough drops to dirty waterspot the windshield. 10 mins later all done and gone. had 100 or so cars there mostly full .....then 3 rain drops fell .....oh hell hit the lights they scattered like roaches!
It was funny as hell to watch all the other folks scrambling like mad racing to get out of there and get their ..precious sugar cars home ....15 mins later had bout 20 cars of us still left laughing at the attempt to rain. few people came back most were done for day.
the wipers on my truck are there and do work in unlikely event of actually needing them ... but mostly for formality rather then functionality.


Larry

SanJuanDigger said:

I have electric wipers too, but here's the beef: the wiper blades themselves. Mine are brand new, and they sort of float over the glass (yes, i've bent the arm a bit to add more pressure). With the 10" wiper blade, I might get 4' of actual wiped surface (that I can see out of), but the rest is distorted by the water. In snow, it's even worse (and my defroster works great). How do you guys run your Willys in rain or snow and actually see out of the windshield?

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John, as mentioned above it has to do with the strength of the spring. Arms designed for vacuum wipers are a lot weaker than those for electric ones. Electric motors have way more torque to move the blades with the extra downward pressure on them.

But will the cable system take the necessary torque?

I'm running an on-the-cheap homemade electric wiper conversion on my wagon. The motor is from a 2002 Chevy Tahoe rear wiper. You can read about it here. It's a single speed motor, and isn't all that fast, but it works and I had the motor on hand.

I'm using the electric motor on the factory cable system, and I've had a few issues with the cables... At first the cables were original. Over time, they stretch enough that there isn't enough adjustment in the tensioner pulleys to take up the slack, and they would derail from the pulleys from time to time. Eventually, the cables broke, because they were weak and the electric motor puts quite a bit more torque on them. The cables both failed inside the wiper transmission (the unit that has the spindle that the wiper the arm mounts to). The cable wraps around a pulley wheel inside the transmission housing, and that seems to be the week spot. I replaced the cables, and without all the slack in the stretched old cables, they haven't derailed since. Even with heavy snow. When the cables are the correct length, you can get them tight enough that they stay on the pulleys.

While you are at it, I'd recommend replacing the cables by following the steps in this great tech post by YellowOctopus. It takes about an hour to do both of them, with simple hand tools.

Pete

Big Dog Frank said:

But will the cable system take the necessary torque?

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Those are steel braided cables if they are in good shape,... not frayed or rustin or on verge of bustin,... Then i would say yes it should handle the torque with ease as if the cables were new it would take quite a bit of tension to break them . I dont know what the overall tensile strength would be for that diameter cable but am sure with good or new cables it would take few hundered pounds of constant tension over time to break them,....something this sytem could never ever produce so you should be just fine.


Larry

Big Dog Frank said:

But will the cable system take the necessary torque?

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My conversion has the 1sp motor. I did that 20 years ago... The Wagon was my DD for a few years and saw lots of use in CO to include wet snow -- never considered torque to be an issue... I think torque could only cause an issue to parts so worn they were already a problem waiting to happen... I'd further venture to say that the sudden surge of vacuum when you crest a hill and let off the gas would cause a bigger torque spike than the electric conversions ever gonna give... but that's just a swag...

David- Thanks for this tip! If I can't find stronger springs, I'll try this. Great idea!

This is the setup I would like to go with if I ever upgrade. Not sure if I will though, as I don't drive it in the rain much. It's looks to be one of the cleanest installations and utilizes the stock switch location.

https://newportwipers.com/product/1946-64-willys/#wiper-motor

Bout only difference i can really see is the price...I paid lot less then $230 for my 2 speed wiper motor for a 50's ford truck off Fleabay.
everything else looks the same.....has same motor coupler...wire harness and switch and mine mounted in stock vac motor location as well.
Only thing i did was to put the wiper switch down in dash face next to the stock ignition switch as i had hole there for choke knob that i dont have.
and put heater knob other side of ashtray opening that was converted to engine dash lights.

Larry