Should I eliminate my wipers?

[NYTRANSAM]

Hey all,


Im restoring a 68 firebird. I going the P-T route and was thinking of eliminating the windshield wipers completely. Im smoothing the fire wall and if I remove the wipers ill fill in the upper valence. My cars never see any rain, and i figure rain-x can help if I get caught in some dizzle. What do you guys think? has anyone done this?

[Vegas69]

I did and have mixed feelings at this point.

[Scott Parkhurst]

I ran without wipers when I lived on the West Coast, and it was a real hassle on the occasional rainy day. I did use Rain-X though...it did help a little.

When I moved to the Midwest I got the wipers working again, and I don't regret it a bit.

I still have to get the heater/defrosters working for those cold and/or wet mornings.

What I'm trying to say is that making all the factory stuff work is a good thing, and getting caught in the rain is rarely something planned. If you drive your car at all, you should have wipers.

If you don't drive your car, you're probably at the wrong web forum.

[mc84_zz4]

Over here state law requires functioning wipers, horn, lights, etc.
Can be open to getting pulled over by officer Bob Speed.

[DLinson]

I don't know how crowded it is under the dash of a Firebird but I hid my DSE wiper motor under the dash and created my own linkage.

I'd rather have the wipers. Rain-X doesn't do well with misty conditions or light rain. That's what I experianced when I used it.

Dennis

[Mkelcy]

No.

[Yoda4561]

Rainx won't help at all in a light drizzle, or if you get caught behind someone on a really wet road when it's not raining. It makes wipers work better in those conditions, but without something forcing water off the windshield droplets just sit there and makes it hard to see. It works fantastic in light rain to heavy downpours once you hit highway speeds, but going slower you need wipers to maintain visibility. Where I live most of the rain I end up driving in is heavy and I'm on the interstate, so my wipers don't see much use, but getting misted by a semi truck after the storm I'm really glad I have them.

[MCMLXIX]

We'll I'm guessing your in NY somewhere so I would say no...

If you plan on driving the car much I would suggest an upgrade to something like DSE offers. I relocated my factory wiper motor under the driver side fender to clean up the firewall. I need to figure out if I'm going to buy the DSE kit or try and make something work on my own. There are a couple guy that have and a few more working on different solutions for a late model wiper and switch...

I guess it comes down to how much effort you want to invest in the wipers...

[MarkM66]

Move the wiper motor to under the drivers side fender, and extend the arm.

[John Wright]

Light drizzle, in the dark with on-coming traffic at any speed and RainX is not a good combination...the glare from headlights and all of those little drops on the windsheild will make it tough to see where the heck you are going.

As the others said, at highway speeds in the dark with no on-coming traffic, RainX is great. You can barely even notice that it is raining at all, even in heavy downpours.

[94SNGLTURBO]

yes get rid of them.. i dont have any on my 65 chevelle

[wmhjr]

Don't get rid of them. I struggled with the decision, but elected to keep wipers while eliminating heater/defroster.

[Vegas69]

Now a heater is just as important as wipers on that dewey morning.

[tomm]

i decided to keep my wipers and move the motor under the driverside fender, not really very hard to do, just keep the angle of the motor the same as original, and lenghthen the linkage, heres where i'm at currently i want to put the new engine and trans in before i button everything up.

thanks tom

[markjanos]

Keep the wipers, unless your building a trailer queen

[parsonsj]

I got rid of mine, for the same reasons: difficulty of packaging everything under the dash, plus some rust issues around the cowl bosses.

I wish I hadn't. I'll never eliminate them again.

jp

[wmhjr]

Now a heater is just as important as wipers on that dewey morning.

That's what a soft rag is for. Seriously, at first I was convinced that the heater/defroster was going to stay. But I thought about it a lot and decided to eliminate it. My harley has a windshield and no defroster/heater and I ride it on this mornings. Who knows - I may regret it later.

[Vegas69]

Except it will keep coming back for a while. We're talking about early in the morning. I never planned to drive mine long distances and to be honest, just put my heat in this month after over a year of driving. I just want heat in general. Wipers aren't that hard to add.

[wmhjr]

I agree with you - except it isn't all that easy to add wipers back when you've smoothed your firewall, etc. Doesn't matter for me. It is what it is, and if I can ride my HD with the windshield in the same weather, on the relatively rare instances it happens with the GTO I'll deal with it.

If you've ever owned an old VW - especially a VW bus - you learn to deal with no defrosters

[Vegas69]

Mine is smoothed as well. Cutting a hole in the firewall wouldn't be fun but not the end of the world.