The wife's XJ over the last few months has developed a bad case of "sloppy wipers". You never know how they are going to work; sometimes the wipers go completely off the windsheild, sometimes they only go about 6" back and forth. It has gotten worse over the past 3 months and I had been meaning to fix it. Yesterday on her way home from work they went from being "sloppy" to being "sloppy and loud". They had now begun to make a popping noise, as if they were binding and now did not really function at all. So she made her plea to me to do something about them (she's 7 months pregnant) and I decided I had better do something about it.

I decided to tear into them today to see what the problem was and how to go about fixing them. It's something I see quite often on other XJ/MJ's that have their wipers not sitting flush. So I figured I'd document what it takes to fix the problem. This also can be used for replacing your wiper motor if it is faulty.

The tools you'll need are the following:

Straight Screwdriver
Phillips Screwdriver
10mm Socket with extension
T30 Torx Screwdriver

Here is a photo of what they typically look like. We usually push them down after we get out. It's quite annoying.



The first step is to remove the wiper arms. On the wiper arm itself there is a little tab (see green arrow) that you pry out with the straight screwdriver. Once the tab is out you can lift up on the wiper arms and they should come off. They may be a bit difficult to get off, so take your time and be careful if you try to pry on them.



Once you get the wiper arms off you need to remove the plastic cowl. Their are 8 phillips screws that need to be removed. The drivers side has 3, the passengers side has 5. Once all 8 of these screws are removed you can gently lift off the cowl. Be careful with it as it is plastic and is very fragile. You will also need to undo the 2 hoses that go to your washer nozels. They simply just pull off. Here is a photo of what it looks like once you have the plastic cowl removed.



Looking down into the exposed hole once you have the cowl removed shows the wiper motor and the linkage.



The next step is to remove the 4 (2 on each side) T30 torx screws that hole the linkage to the metal of the cowl.



Next you need to remove the 10mm bolt that holes the motor bracket on. You'll also want to undo the wiring harness that goes to the motor.



Once you have done all the above steps the linkage assembly should be loose and you can gently work it out. I would recommend wearing a pair of gloves doing this step as the metal is sharp and you can easily cut your hands trying to get it out. Take your time and I swear it does come out; it just takes a bit of work maneuvering it correctly.

Once I had it out I realized the reason for the "popping" that had been occurring. The bracket that holds the motor to the linkage had broken off and the arm was bent (GREAT!). So I thought about trying to fix it but it looked to be in to bad of shape. So I called a fellow GLXJ member (woodywagon) that had a parts XJ and made the trip over to his house to take the linkage off of it. Thanks again Rex!

Here is a photo of the new (non-broke) linkage compared to the broken linkage. You can clearly see that the spot welds failed and the bracket is no longer attached.



The wife's XJ is a 1993 and the new linkage I got was off a Renix era XJ. One thing I immediately noticed was the arm where the bracket for the motor attaches is more "beefy" on the Renix era linkage assembly than it was on the 1993 assembly. It also had 2 additional larger spot welds on it for the bracket.



I now needed to swap the motor over to the new linkage assembly. For those of you who are replacing a bad motor this step also is for you. You need to remove 4 bolts; 3 that hold the motor to the bracket and than 1 that holds the linkage to the motor. All are 10mm.



The "sloppy wiper" syndrome is due to bad bushings in the linkage assembly. If you go to your local auto-parts store and in the "shelf help" section you can find new linkage bushings. I got them at AutoZone for $4.99.



The package says that they work with 1994-2001 Cherokee's; however I'm going to assume that they work for all model's. The package comes with several bushings, your only after 3 of them. You'll notice when you get them what 3 they are comparing them to the originals.

Their are 3 bushings that you need to replace. I've attached 2 photo's to show what ones.





They are basically just a ball and cup bushing. Take the old one's out (if they are worn they should somewhat easily pull out) and put the new ones in. The new one's may be a bit hard to get in, so use caution trying to get (force) them in as they are plastic.

Than reassembly everything and than reinstall the linkage/motor and install back in your Jeep.

Once you have it wired up and the linkage all tightened down I recommend running the motor and making sure everything cycles correctly. This all makes sure that your linkage is in the correct spot in the off position so you can reassembly your wiper arms correctly.

Once everything is good put the cowl back together and reinstall your wiper arms in the position you want them.

Your now finished and you should have a new revived wiper system. The process is fairly easy, just somewhat time consuming. Should be able to do the job start to finish in about 2 hours.

And here is a photo of the new fixed wipers. They are now correctly parking at the bottom in the off position. It's also a good time to change your wiper blades as we did!