I like a clean windscreen, so my wipers wear out very quickly, after a year or a few thousand miles.
I accept that a new pair of wipers costs less than £20, and apparently Halfords do replacement rubber strips for £9, but it's still a waste of raw materials and you have the faff of going to the shop and then fitting them.
It finally dawned on me that it is the outside end of the passenger side wiper that wears out first... and why.
It is pretty obvious once you think about it. The outside end of a wiper travels a lot further than the inside end and the passenger side wiper travels nearly twice as far as the driver's side wiper, image from here:
Solution: once they start to fade a bit, remove the rubber strips from each wiper and swap them over so that the outside passenger wiper end is now the inside driver wiper end and vice versa. If your wipers are different lengths, then just turn them 'inside out' on each side.
I tried it this weekend and it works a treat. How come nobody tells me these things?
Sunday, 11 March 2018
How to double the life of your windscreen wipers.
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13 comments:
S'funny. I think the drivers side wears out first - because you use it most...
b-b-but my car only has one wiper! It's so unfair!
And no, before anyone thinks I drive something German and top of the range- it's an elderly pre-electronic age non-turbo diesel 'roen ZX, a French Tractor of a car . 0-60 in a week but it has actual real metal bits in it.
L, doesn't matter, you can still swap them side to side and end to end.
JK, doesn't matter, you can still swap it end to end.
On some modern cars the front wipers are of different lengths to prevent the blades coming into contact and jamming, so you can't just swap them over. However, if you can, and merely swap the blades over, then surely the passenger's vision is affected by poor cleaning of the windscreen?
When I clean the car, I wipe the blades with wd40 which helps keep the silicone supple and I have found it lengthens their life.
MW. My post was a joke - sort of...
MW. My post was a joke - sort of... -Lola
As was mine and no sorta; that was why it was written in Brexiteur-snowflake-whinge tone....at least at the start.
Ps, nope. Passenger side vision clearly is mproved. Ta for wd40 tip.
L, JK, I am perfectly aware of that. But the trick still works.
It's an old trick...It was particularly useful in old cars with flat windscreen and straight wipers.
L, I'm sure it is an old trick. So why did nobody tell me?
MW. You (probably sensibly) don't mix in the right circles (nerdy car people).
Hoist with my own petard this a.m. Having been glib about potholes in your previous posting Mrs L managed to smash a tyre into one this a.m. (Mind you she drives around in blissful ignorance of much of what's goi9ng on around her...)
L, I am sorry to hear that. Hope it doesn't cost too much.
MW £102. Ouch
L, that's not too terrible, is it?
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