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Wiper motor, etc... proper lubricant

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Whitephrog

Luke Skywalker
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What's the proper lubricant for 1) the wiper motor, 2) the wiper boxes and 3) the wiper cable?
 
Years ago I used regular axle grease. That is NOT what I should have used. I recently had to re-lube the square wiper motor on our GT6 and this time I took the cleaned parts and lubed the motor gears with Vaseline. I degreased the flexible rack and lubed it with Vaseline also. I soaked the oilite motor bushings in 20W oil. Finally, I modified some plastic cap-plugs to work as oil cups and placed these over the wheelbox shafts over night. The oil ran down into the wheelbox bushings and lubed them. Now the wipers work faster than they have in the 16+ years we've owned the car.

There may be specific grease called out for the motor gears and flexible rack. Since you are unlikely to find the exact grade and brand of British grease originally used, I'd just make sure whatever grease you use is thin and light to minimize drag.
 
I have always used GP (general purpose) grease for the cable and gearboxes & 3in1 oil for the motor bushings but others will have other opinions.
Bill
 
I used to use vasoline but it melted out of my wiper motor in the hot summer heat.
Now I lube the motor and rack with white lithium grease from one of those squeeze tubes.
So far so good, a few cars done this way and some years under their belts and they are all still fine.
 
White lithium grease is I think what was originally found in them! Vaseline will liquify in short order and axle grease is a bit heavy for the application!
 
Lithium grease will indeed stay in place longer than the Vaseline. However, I'm content with what I achieved recently.

I do not think Lithium grease was the original factory lube. When I was having trouble identifying the orientation of the conical spring washer for the square wiper motors I had a friend in the U.K. photograph the insides of one for me. He said that the motor shown in the link below has NEVER been opened until this photograph was taken.
https://www.146g.com/images/dr3a_5.jpg

You'll note that this grease isn't white, off-white, or even grey from metal particles, it's thick and brown like axle grease.
 
The two I've opened and cleaned looked exactly like that.

I found several references to Ragosine Listate grease and Shell Turbo 41 oil as the original lubricant. Castrol LM is supposed to be the modern equilivant. I understand that Castrol LM is a high melting point lithium based grease.
 
Any old grease will work fine. Not a big deal at all.
 
Jack, in Florida I imagine any grease would work. However, when fall and winter bring temperatures below freezing, thick grease will slow the wipers to a useless speed. (And I only live in NC where cold isn't that bad). However, that's why I now have Vaseline in my wiper gears and 20W oil in the bushings.
 
I'm sure that will work just fine although the vasoline scares me a bit if you get some real hot weather.
 
Understood. If Vaseline sounds too thin then by all means us a light lithium grease.
 
I really think that would be best and is what I used.
 
Took the cover off a virgin NOS wiper motor to install the cable. Here's what I found. https://tinyurl.com/mswlb8

By the way, what's the proper routing of the cable? Does it go between the stiffener and the scuttle panel as it travels from the driver side box toward the passenger side box?
 
You found a NOS square wiper motor? That must have cost a mint! That's a great looking motor!
 
Came with the project car along with a bunch of other NOS stuff the PO had purchased in 1978 but never installed. The photos at Spritespot.com show most of the NOS stuff. In addition to the NOS stuff he had rebuilt the transmission and carbs but never installed them either.
 
That's a wonderful photo log of your work. Excellent photographs.

I have a question though. The replacement NOS wiper motor you installed does not appear to have the self-parking switch. Would a Bugeye have had the self parking motor as shown in the "before" photographs, or is the NOS motor you have correct?
 
Pop my bubble!! This is a DR2 wiper motor but w/o the self park switch. I have the original DR2 w/the self parking switch that I intend to re-build. I may have a NOS wiper wiper motor for sells soon. Got to think about this for a while.
 
Sorry... I didn't mean to ruin this for you. I was just curious which type of motor the Bugeye should have.
 
Looks good to me. Note what is painted and how.
 
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