wipers

[iallen1@btinter]

Aparently the auto wipers dont kick in until ure doing 19 kmh, obviously when its raining, but it was drizzling the other day, and i set them to intermittent, every six seconds, this was perfect, but when i was moving a bit the auto kicked in, so whats the point in setting it to what you want when it gets overuled by the auto kick in, seems daft to me, is there something im missing

[maisbitt]

Do your wipers wipe properly? I have a smear arc in the middle of my wipers swept area on my Scirocco, and it is a common thing apparently.

I don't anticipate there being much difference between the wiper system on the Scirocco and on the MK6 Golf (same parts , only the shape and angle of the windscreen being a little different).

My auto wipers wipe at a standstill, but the rain has to be quite heavy for it to do so, heavier than the rain needed once moving (I suppose the car moving towards the rain increases the impact of the rain on the screen for the sensors to pick up), so once moving, I sometimes have to adjust the sensitivity lower.

[Autobulbs]

[QUOTE=maisbitt;370814]Do your wipers wipe properly? I have a smear arc in the middle of my wipers swept area on my Scirocco, and it is a common thing apparently.



Do you have standard stock blades on your car or have you replaced them, and if so with what type of blades? The reason for asking is you really shouldn't be getting any smear lines.

[maisbitt]

autobulbs.

Stock blades, car is 2 weeks old and hadn't had to use them until last thursday. The smear happens just below the knuckle area of the wiper blade on each arm. Not replaced them - warranty will have to do that.

It is supposed to be a common issue with Sciroccos - i'm sure my dealer will knowledge of it being a common fault. Wasn't sure if the fault was present on MK6 Golfs too?

[Autobulbs]

If you have the new flat blades as standard (also known as Aerotwin blades) You can try bending the tips of the blades up a little. This will help bend the blade into the shape of the windscreen and sit better in the middle. These blades are designed to sit very flat to the windscreen to stop gaps in the sweep so you really shouldn't be experiencing this especially on a new car. Failing this I would get them replaced under warranty terms. Hope this helps and you get it sorted.

[maisbitt]

I'll let the warranty take care of the correctives rather than bend the blades myself and be told that I caused the problem by the dealer.

The upward sweep is faultless, but on the return sweep, an inch wide arc under the centre of each blade causes a smear. There is some play in the arm to blade pivot joint, but there is nothing loose, the 2mm play seems to have been designed that way, with no defects apparent.

The smear is extremely thin, and almost evaporates by the time of the next sweep if the rain is extremely light, with a sweep every 10 seconds.

Back to the dealership tomorrow......

[iallen1@btinter]

mine judder a bit going down

[dubcruiser]

I would try cleaning the windscreen with some de-greasing agent. The smearing is probably causes by wax or other silicone cleaning agent thats been used when the car was PDI'd....

[maisbitt]

The whole windscreen does appear to have been waxed, as the rain beads on it, but only a small part of the screen, directly under the centre of the blades is affected by the smearing.

[james_tiger_woo]

I'll be Rain-X ing mine tonight - If I can be bothered that is...

[maisbitt]

That stuff looks great in the demo vid on it's website - but they only show you how it good it works without the wipers.

Anyone using a wash wax is probably snookered if they wash their car more often than they apply rain X, as the wax will lie on top of it.

I use a Simoniz wash/wax solution to wash my car every week, and then everything except the front and back windscreens gets a Mer wax/polish once every 2 months (every month for the whhels - stops the brake dust sticking.

I'm a bit skeptical about rain x's advice for removing "contaminants" such as wax from the windscreen - "use an abrasive cleaner such as Cif" - are they mad? That will scratch the glass up no end! Windscreen glass isn't very scratch resistant. I thought a vinegar based glass cleaner would be better.

I'm going to clean the windscreen with glass cleaner tonight, to ensure that it's not the presence of wax causing my smearing.

[machine]

I wouldn't have thought CIF was abrasive enough to scratch glass, whilst windscreen glass isn't as hard as say the mineral glass on a watch it's still one of the hardest surfaces about.

[maisbitt]

I certainly wouldn't risk Cif to find out, it doesn't seem like it takes much to scratch a windscreen. Cif will put swirl scratches into a stainless steel sink, probably wouldn't do anything to mineral glass, but i'd rather use a glass cleaner to clean glass. The vinegar based glass cleaners will definitely take care of any wax on there.

[HHGTTG]

I certainly wouldn't risk Cif to find out, it doesn't seem like it takes much to scratch a windscreen. Cif will put swirl scratches into a stainless steel sink, probably wouldn't do anything to mineral glass, but i'd rather use a glass cleaner to clean glass. The vinegar based glass cleaners will definitely take care of any wax on there.
If you're worried about CIF then try a cheap brand toothpaste or perhaps metal cleaner such as Brasso or Silvo. I have used both of the last two to remove persistent road film with much success.

[maisbitt]

Well, I took the car back to the local VW dealer, and they spent 30 mins with it.

As a bit of background, i'd thoroughly checked the windscreen for anything nasty stuck to it, and i'd also checked the wiper blades, at all points, not just the main rubber blade, but the secondary "T" pieces also, to make sure that they were undamaged and nothing stuck to them or in them.

30 mins later, the VW guy has replaced the wiper, and said that I had some debris on the windscreen that had pulled a chunk out of the wiper blade. He didn't print off an warranty invoice for me to sign (as they usually do for warranty work) , and according to his diagnosis, I didn't think the warranty would cover it anyway.

The explanation was totally incorrect, I don't know whether that's VW trying to discretely put right a known fault for the Scirocco wipers, and making out that they've done you a good-will gesture in replacing a blade.

The new blade works fine, and the tension of the arm on the screen seems to have been adjusted (less firmly held). The windscreen still seems to have it's coat of wash/wax on it, as water still beads on it.

I'm happy with the result, but am mystified as to why VW has to lie about the cause and think's we're all a bit green behind the ears. If a bit of muck had pulled a chunk out of the blade rubber, that would imply to me that the standard wiper blades weren't very robust.

[Robbie G]

I certainly wouldn't risk Cif to find out, it doesn't seem like it takes much to scratch a windscreen. Cif will put swirl scratches into a stainless steel sink, probably wouldn't do anything to mineral glass, but i'd rather use a glass cleaner to clean glass. The vinegar based glass cleaners will definitely take care of any wax on there.

It's the scourer that people usually use with Cif that causes the swirls, not the Cif itself!

Regarding the wiper issue, I wouldn't get too over-excited. The wiper was faulty, he replaced it free of charge, end of story surely? If there was some huge issue with new VW wipers in general then how would a simple wiper blade swap have fixed it?

You say you checked the blades - maybe there was a defect you didn't spot?

[maisbitt]

It's a documented issue, on the Scirocco at least - and I had unclipped the blade housing for a proper look. The rubber was completely undamaged (no creases or tears, nothing lodged in the rubber), and the windscreen was clean when i'd checked. I didn't use the wipers again between checking them out and getting to the dealership.

It's all fine now, but I hope the new set are of a slightly different design or the same could happen again after using a few times.

I wouldn't be confident about the longer term rubber blade robustness if there had been a chunk of rubber missing due to a piece of dirt on the windscreen, after what amounts to 20 mins of wiper action (at low speeds - haven't had any heavy rain whilst driving) in the 3 weeks I have had the car.

The blade set up looks exactly like that of the MK6 Golf, although the angle of the glass rake is slightly different on the Golf, and probably should have a different arm spring tension. It's just something that Scirocco and MK6 Golf owners might want to look out for.

[maisbitt]

First bit of rain with the new wipers on, and they leave twice as much smear as the original ones - this is going to be a long series of events at the dealers methinks.

[iallen1@btinter]

on my mk 6 golf the blades seem to flip over on the downward movement, not sure if this normal or me being daft

[HHGTTG]

on my mk 6 golf the blades seem to flip over on the downward movement, not sure if this normal or me being daft
Of course they should flip over providing that the blade edge is trailing in the direction of the sweep, i.e the tip of the blade should be behind the direction of travel otherwise you'd get juddering.

[maisbitt]

The smearing on mine is on the bit of blade around the centre of the blade housing, where the wiper arm and blade meet at the knuckle. There has got to be something wrong with the knuckle or the spring tension. The wipe is smear-free on the upstroke, it's just the downstroke that is poor.

The knuckle isn't a tight pivotted joint, there is some horizontal play on the knuckle (about 1mm) that seems to be there by design and not by fault.

My recent dealership experience just shows that once again, VW Dealership technicians (in my experience) don't really know what they're doing. They'll swap part X for part Y and hope that does it.

I'll have to go back to them.