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#505143 - 04/25/08 06:13 PM
37 Zephyr wipers
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peter_smith
Member
Registered: 12/20/05
Posts: 61
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Hello All
If your a purist, please don't read this, move on to the next topic, I am sure I suffered phsychological damage after I was blasted on this list for fitting an alternator on my 37 zephyr, I only recovered due to the efforts of Doctor C Boz, who restored my sense of humour. A man might I add who only bought his Lincoln because of the generator, and not because of how the car looked, or the V12 engine.
I have never been a lover of vacuum wipers, when mine expired on the zephyr, I thought an electric conversion might be the answer, but I wanted to be able to return to vacuum wipers maybe in the future, and retain the original operating knob on the top of the dash, this meant no butchering of the vacuum unit, and any new electric wiper motor would have to fit in with what was already there.
Having looked at a few modern motors which are now very powerful, and move very long wiper arms and blades at a very fast rate, I thought a 12volt motor running off 6 volts at its fast setting would provide a nice pace for those small arms and blades.
A motor off a Vauxhall Corsa seemed to fit the bill (GM but I'm not racist), all the automatic stop wiring was removed from the motor gearbox, leaving only the fast and slow speed wires coming from the motor.
The motor was mounted from a bracket to two holes in the body bracing strut to the left of the passenger glovebox, picture 1 (this is a RH Drive car), I had to reduce the stroke of the motor arm to suite the stroke of the original units which are about 1 5/8" as I remember, so the arm on the motor was shortened to 13/16" centres, this as it turned full circle would give the correct stroke, the original Vauxhall link was extended and clamped to the passenger side wiper link rod, so that adjustment could be made, it runs above the top of the glovebox and is well out of the way.
Now there was the problem of retaining the the original operating knob.
I took the vacuum unit off to see if I could graft a switch on to it, but there is not a lot of room up behind the dash. I ended up removing the operating slide, made a new one in plastic material with a brass contact on the end, I also made an insulated fixed contact which fastens to the body of the unit, this allowed the use of the original operating knob and linkage, see pics 2 and 3, I added an in line fuse to the switch feed and connected the other switch wire to the fast speed wire on the motor, and that was it job done, and nothing altered which could not be returned to original spec.
It works very well and I am pleased with the result, I am sure LH drive cars could be converted in a similar way if need be, even as a temporary solution until a suitable vacuum unit turned up.
I took a picture of the completed instalation, unfortunately it did not come out, and I had already refitted the glovebox.
Hopefully I will be going to our Lincoln meet at the ROG in July, it's about 260 miles each way for me, looking forward to meeting everyone just hope everything holds together for the trip, not bothered about rain though.
Regards
Peter Smith UK
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#506381 - 04/30/08 03:32 PM
Re: 37 Zephyr wipers
[Re: peter_smith]
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Mike Cullen
Member
Registered: 04/30/02
Posts: 529
Loc: Florida
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Nice work again Peter! I'm still screwing around with the vacuum wipers in my 36, they work, but not quite right yet.
A warning to anyone else who is fiddling with the vacuum wiper motors, especially with the motor installed and reaching under the dash blindly to try the adjustments. A vacuum motor can bite, It's amazing how much torque that bugger has, and how tightly it can grab your finger if you aren't paying attention! (at least so I've heard!) 
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#506396 - 04/30/08 04:30 PM
Re: 37 Zephyr wipers
[Re: Mike Cullen]
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peter_smith
Member
Registered: 12/20/05
Posts: 61
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Err, which finger did you loose then Mike???
Regards
Peter Smith
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