Hello VW experts,
Have an '80 VW Rabbit, Westmoreland style w/ square headlights. About a year ago, I upgraded the car to intermittent wipers, intending to save the wear and tear on the wiper motor, linkages, and blades.
Prior to doing that upgrade, the wipers would occasionally not park correctly (just stop), although this was usually at the end of the dry season here in California, when the wipers had not been used for months. That first rain I would have wiper parking problems on the first or second usage, then the problem would go away.
So added a Audi variable-delay relay in place of the little metal link in the relay plate, and pulled the lock-out plastic tab from the steering column after pulling the steering wheel off. Amazingly, the intermittent feature worked right off the bat. I figured out how to set the delay the VW way, and it worked pretty well, for awhile.
So after a month or two, I would sometimes not get any movement of the wipers when moving the steering column wiper lever down to initiate the delay setting. I did note however, that if I just used the wipers on the regular low setting for awhile, exercising the motor, I could often get the correct response out of the intermittent lever-down setting, and then I could engage the intermittent feature. That sure sounds like a problem in the motor, either with moisture or a high-resistance problem, especially since that same circuit is involved with parking the blades, according to the Bentley factory manual. Given what I've seen of VW electricals in my years of owning this car, I'm not overly surprised.
A few weeks ago, I had the intermittent feature going during a light rain that slowly got heavier. I reduced the delay and was driving home happily. All of a sudden, in midstroke, the wiper blades stopped. I have not been able to engage the intermittent feature since, only being able to use the regular low or hi speeds. No parking problem, though.
Not real happy dropping $60-70 for the Audi variable-delay relay to not have much use of the intermittent feature.
From other postings on this newsgroup, I have learned that there is some kind of relay circuit attached to the motor. Is this worth going after in terms of opening up and trying to clean up or rebuild? Would a good hit of WD-40 work on this thing (I know that WD-40 is bad for some plastics)? Any way to check that it works before reinstallation (I can supply a separate 12V feed)? I know that when I was working on trying to solve a chattering problem a couple of years ago, the wiper motor would get pretty warm after working awhile, and there was a fairly bright arc/spark going on down in the motor, so it may just be time to pop $90-100 for a new motor, or try and find one in a junkyard. Do I need to worry about a given motor not having the intermittent capability, or are all these motors for Rabbits of this vintage pretty much the same beast. Pulled the linkage off the motor drive shaft when I was working on the chattering problem, and that was not too bad, although I haven't pulled a wiper motor yet from one of these vehicles. Doesn't look too hard...
I also have a ? about the relay plate under the dash, but I'll wait to post that to see if this post generates any response.
Thanks, Chuck