C-3 1970 coupe wiper arm

[Jack bogosian]

The wiper arms on my 1970 have a pipe were the washer fluid comes out.. The one on the driver side look different than the passenger side. The one on the passenger side has the pipe on the top,,, That pipe popped off and seems to hit the door before it enters into the lower section..Can I repair this wiper arm where the pipe popped off or do I have to convert it all to a rubber hoses now ,,, Thanks

[Michael M.]

Re: C-3 1970 coupe wiper arm

I believe that pipe was soldered on to the clip, and can and should be repaired vs replaced.

[Jack H.]

More...

The washer tubes typically fatigue fracture because the set of plastic clips that held them to the wiper arm got sun baked and fell apart. Without the plastic clips in place, you have the bottom end of the washer tube connected to the rubber washer hoses and attached to the wiper arm by only the solder pot joint at the top end of the wiper arm.

The back-forth wiping action of the wiper arms causes the rubber washer tubes to act as 'springs' and finally fatigue fracture the brass washer tubes altogether. The stress/strain is WORSE on the passenger side arm than on the driver's side. That's the first to go...

Plus, the brass tube almost always fatigue fractures damaging the tube itself. In this case, if only the tube has worked out of its solder pot U-joint, the poster got REAL lucky! But, simply re-installing the brass washer tube to the wiper arm is NOT the long term answer. He should replace the black plastic clips that hold the washer tube(s) to the arm(s) in several places while he's at it.

The washer tube can be either re-soldered to the wiper arm's U-joint solder pot (silver solder is preferable to std radio/TV solder) OR an epoxy like JB Weld can be used with equivalent holding power. Paragon now supplies reproduction black plastic clips for the RH as well as LH arm (a different clip count per arm), so that's a solved science now!

[Jim T.]

Re: More...

My 70's passenger wiper washer tube came lose from the wiper very early in its service life. I used a fine wire to secure it over 30 years ago and it is still holding up just fine.