How NOT to Smoke the Wiper Motor?!

Gotta love that wiring . . .
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mbovino
Posts: 33
Joined: Sun Jan 27, 2013 9:49 pm
Your car is a: 1980 Fiat 2000

How NOT to Smoke the Wiper Motor?!

Post by mbovino »

I've been putting my car back together over a seemingly endless restoration period. I've gone through the wiper linkage making sure that everything is nicely lubricated and moving well. But before I bolt it back on the car I'd like to test the motor. I have the wiring diagram from Brad A but I'm scratching my head as to which of the five wires (I know which is ground) I should energize without risk of smoking the motor. I considered myself adept at reading wiring diagrams until I looked at that one, as some of the symbols have me puzzled (perhaps they indicate separate poles on the motor).

I searched the archives and found the following wiring descriptions/functions. My car is a 1980 so the convention is the same. Can someone please advise which colored wire(s) can be safely connected to 12v+ so I can confirm that the motor works and then parks correctly? Thank you!

Here are the wires coming from the car's harness and their function:

Blue/Black --> Always hot when ignition switch is on
Blue/White --> Hot only when wipers are in constant mode
Black/Grey --> Hot on both slow and fast, constant and intermittent
Blue --> Hot only on fast speed
Grey --> Hot only on slow speed
Black --> Ground
spider2081
Patron 2024
Patron 2024
Posts: 3015
Joined: Fri Jan 27, 2006 11:45 pm
Your car is a: 1981 Spider 2000
Location: Wallingford,CT

Re: How NOT to Smoke the Wiper Motor?!

Post by spider2081 »

Can someone please advise which colored wire(s) can be safely connected to 12v+ so I can confirm that the motor works and then parks correctly? Thank you!
I am assuming you are connecting the motor wires to test the motor out of the car. Like a bench test.

The case of the motor and the black wire are ground. So your 12 volts negative needs a good connection to the motor case either by the black wire or directly to the case.

Connecting 12 volts + to the light blue wire should make the motor rotate in the slow speed
Connecting 12 volts + to the gray wire should make the motor rotate in the faster speed.

To check the park position and the park/delay switch first jump the gray/black wire to either light blue or the gray motor wire, then connect the motors blue/black wire to the 12 volts + the motor should run to the park position. When the motor is parked the light blue/white wire should have 12 volts + on it. This voltage is used to power the delay timer. The delay timer only has power on this wire when the wipers are in the park position.

Hope this helps
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