once again, the disclaimer: i'm not the expert mechanic like many on here (yes i'm jealous) and i thought i had my 91 LWB all good to go -- now the wipers, which i thought were fixed, are unraveling at the seams. pass. side wiper started to fall well below the windshield line in the cycle..then it would bind up everything; i'd have to manually reset the wiper to the right place, i'd get 2 or 3 passes, then it would bind up again. the whole shaft has too much play, it won't "lock" at its low point like the drivers side does. so i took that side wiper arm off today. one wiper (illegal here in PA) but working ok. until now. just died and can't get to work, in a snowstorm. no wipers. help!!

and also now, the doorlocks are not wanting to stay unlocked. as soon as the door is unlocked via key, you get about a 1 second window to open the door before all the locks dive again. i can't pay more money for all of this crap, and i don't know where to look to do any problem-solving.

any help / advice would be greatly appreciated.

make sure your wipers are set in the right spot and make sure they are tightened properly to the assembly. For the door locks, the grease gets old and the actuators aren't as strong as they used to be, either lube them or just time your door opening right. <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/lol.gif" alt="" /> I know mine I would kind of chuckle at the little ballet that would go on between them trying to figure out what position to stay in. <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/lol.gif" alt="" />

Wipers; make sure the wiper arm shaft retaining nut is tight so the shaft stays aligned. If it is, you have to take the dash apart to get at the wiper linkage and see what's broken.

Door locks: The electric actuators in the doors get a short inside. If all the locks are diving locked, it is in the driver's or passenger's door. Pull the door lock fuse and manually lock until you can get it fixed.

i was able to get the linkage out of mine by accessing everything through the panels on the firewall under the hood...well, panel, as the driver's side has the wiper motor where the panel would be.

i took my linkage out a while back, checked the condition of everything, lubed all of the joints with SS2000 grease. after cleaning/playing with the couple old spare wiper motors i had, i ended up getting a reman'd one from Napa and its been great ever since.

from last year -

I took my door panels off and sprayed some lube on the lock motors and linkage. I did this about a year ago. They locks work better than ever.

yep, i did the same for my rear power lock linkage, etc when it started to stick. that was about 6 mos ago and it's been fine.

thanks everyone--looks like i need a new linkage--or at the very least i need to get to the linkage and see what's up--maybe lube it, etc -- i've never taken off the dash--or those that got at the linkage from the firewall area, how?? also--if i need a whole linkage, is this all one unit (motor and everything)? and if so, is this going to be another used part / hunting it down kind of thing?

My low model Raider only has a rear power lock. A few years ago it stopped working / didnt work very well.

I took it out cleaned it and lubed it. Still worked half heatedly, just barely moving.

Short story: It turns out that the contacts in the switch got dirty and develop a large voltage drop. After fixing the actuator multiple times I finally found the root cause for mine, a dirty switch. I'm sure the that cleaning the actuator was a good thing.

Bottom line? Lube the door mechanisms but don't forget to check out the switches.

That reminds me that I should go lube my wiper pivots. While taking them apart and lubing them is the best method, a few drops of 3 in 1 oil on the tops of the shafts has been working very well.


Kevin

definitely take the linkage out and service it - clean it up, lube the cups, etc. when you disassemble it, you might notice when you pry apart the cups that little plastic pieces will break off from the inner center of the cups - that is ok. it will still reassemble just fine, atleast mine did without issue.

as far as how i did it, it's been quite a while, but i believe i undid the passenger side cover on the underhood firewall and realized that wasn't going to help me. then i removed the motor on the exact opposite side, undid the cup that pops on the arm of the motor, and i believe i undid all of the wiper stuff - the covers, top nuts, etc all the way down so the nubs will pop down into the cowl channel. then i pulled the whole linkage through the spot where the motor was mounted.

see if this helps - http://www.iammike.org/htmods/montero_wiper.pdf

Yup, that's what I did as well recently. Before removing the wiper arms I marked where they fell on the windshield with blue painters tape so I could put them back on the shafts with at least an attempt at the proper location. My drivers-side shaft had bound up in the pivot, and the entire pivot was rotating in the hole in the cowling <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/scared.gif" alt="" />

Interestingly enough, once I R&R'd the wipers and tightened down the mounting nuts that hold the pivot in place in the cowling, the lake that used to appear in the drivers-side foot well whenever it rained has disappeared entirely and the floor has been dry through the last couple of deluges <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/kewl.gif" alt="" />

Eric W.