Mk 1 Yaris intermittant wipe not working

[talldave]

Hi all - the intermittant windscreen wipe on my 1999 1.0 petrol Mk1 Yaris has stopped working. Normal speed and fast speed both still work OK, but not intermittant. Also when I pull the stalk lever towards me to get the squirt onto the windsreen, the squit works but the wipers don't operate (i.e. I don't get the normal 2 or 3 wipes that I should).

Any ideas? Is this likely to be a fault in the stalk on the steering column or with the wiper motor itself? How does the intermittant wipe actually work? Is it a timer/rotating contact/heated expanding bimetalic strip?

Thanks in advance.

[talldave]

In case anyone is interested, I replaced the wiper stalk with one I bought from eBay and that fixed the problem. Easy to replace it - only took half an hour.

[SB1500]

7 minutes ago, talldave said:

In case anyone is interested, I replaced the wiper stalk with one I bought from eBay and that fixed the problem. Easy to replace it - only took half an hour.

Thanks for posting back with a resolution. Might help other owners in the future. Any photos of the job? 

I had a similar issue with an older car where the wipers stopped working altogether, but the wiring suggested signals were sent properly. It ended up being the wiper motor. I had also bought a spare stalk / switch unit just in case. Glad you got sorted 🙂

 

 

[talldave]

Sorry, no photos of doing the job - just a couple of the wiper stalk - but basically:

Undo three screws (left, right and bottom) to remove the two parts of the steering wheel housing. Prise the two parts apart.

Unclip the cable connector from the bottom of the wiper stalk.

Press in the clip that holds the wiper stalk in place.

Pull out the wiper stalk.

Refitting is the reverse of removal (as Haynes always say!).

[littlegamer]

Hello,

I have created an account here to share my learnings on this issue in a 2005 Yaris P1 refresh. I ran into the same thing which was also caused by the switch, but because the switch allows access to its internals with just 2 screws and 2 clips, the switch can be repaired without replacement. The root cause of why these switches fail is because the contact material Toyota used is unplated copper, which is not very suitable for switches because it oxidizes quickly without plating. They made it work with some pasty lubricant which by now starts to fail. Mine was pretty oxidized. Removing the oxidation and relubricating the switch will address this. I found that all my contact cleaner solvents do not attack the copper oxide so I came up with a pretty specific solution for this application. 

Materials needed:

- Coffee machine descaler solution based on citric acid
- Contact flushing spray that leaves no residue - eg IPA, Kontakt WL or WD-40 specialist contact spray
- Contact lubricant - eg Kontakt 61 or DeoxIT F5
- Cue tips, paper towels

Procedure:

1 - Open the switch by removing 2 screws and opening 2 clips on the side.

2 - Observe that there is a second switch in the deep section. Take out its wiping element by sliding it to the side and pulling it out. 

3 - Wipe off all old lubricant inside both sides of the switch and the wiping element. Flush out the remaining lubricant with the contact flushing spray.

4 - Allow to dry for at least an hour in open air. You can speed this up with an air compressor. 

5 - Saturate cue tips with descaler and rub the oxidation off all copper areas until nice and shiny. This typically takes 2 passes and a lot of cue tips. 

6 - Flush the switch again thoroughly with the contact flushing spray and allow to dry.

7 - Apply contact lubricant on all copper areas generously.

8 - Reassemble

With clean copper and suitable lubricant like the ones I mentioned, this should be considered a high quality refurbishment that will likely last longer than the car. The lubricant Toyota used was not very good and neither is the base material for lack of plating, and this repair addresses that. Hopefully it is of use to someone, good luck!