Wiper Motor Wiring Diagram

[Kubelmann]

Here is another corrected terminal functions for the Thing wiper wiring diagram.



Here is a basic procedure to intitially diagnose the components of a Thing wiper system

Pull the brown and black connector from the wiper motor. Attach a volt meter with the negative lead to the brown wire and positive to the black wire. Turn on the ignition switch Turn the wiper switch to the first click or speed one. The volt meter should read 12 vdc Replace the black wire.

Pull the brown and black and yellow connector from the wiper motor. Attach a volt meter with the negative lead to the brown wire and positive to the black and yellow wire. Turn on the ignition switch Turn the wiper switch to the second click or speed two. The volt meter should read 12 vdc

If either of these tests fail you have a bad wiper switch or a bad power lead or a bad wiring ground. The bottom line is you have a wiper switch problem.

Using an external source of 12 vdc other than your car, attach the negative lead of a 12 vdc source to the wiper motor negative terminal (where the brown wire goe) and positive to the terminal (where the black wire goes. The motor should turn speed one or slow.

Using an external source of 12 vdc other than your car, attach 12 vdc to the wiper motor negative to the terminal where the brown wire goes and positive to the terminal where the black and yellow wire goes. The motor should turn speed two or fast.

[Al Capulco]

Hey RW, Nice write up... but that picture of the wiper motor terminals is marked wrong for 73 and 74 thing wiper motors. Its been floating around for some time now and I just noticed it. I believe that the black with the white stripe wire is the power or what I would call the hot wire. It is the one that is always hot when the key is on and it is terminal 53a not 31b. The green wire is the park wire. The picture of the terminals may be for a wiper motor for a pre 73 type 181. As you know they are different.

[Kubelmann]

Thanks for the input. I have now corrected that old drawing one more time. This is getting funny. The original picture that I recently edited was way way wrong. Now I just examined a terminal numbers on different terminal plates and notice that therw are some differences in all of them. The 53 series and 31 changes from part to part. Very inconsistent, the good news is that the wiring colors are in the correct terminal for diagnosis. I swapped green and black/white in their functions so now the diagram (finally) should be all correct. The terminal numbers mean little the position and function of the terminals is all that matters...

I never noticed the differences in the terminal number because the location of each terminal was the focus not the number... funny.. learning is sure fun.