Car: Corrado

Time Required: 20-30 minutes.

Tools Needed: Vice, rags, Bosch Micro Edge Blades (see Part 2 for sizing)

Part 1: Increasing the "Down-Force"

Not enough down force-from the factory wiper arms ? Hmmmm strange! I think the machine making them over there in Germany only operated on Monday mornings... Soooo, here is how I went about solving the problem, seemingly for good. First of all, make sure you have access to a vice, and remember that the piece we are about to modify is made out of soft metal (some-what brittle).

1. Remove the wiper arm from the vehicle.
2. Find a decent, thicker rag to wrap the wiper arm.
3. Wrap the bottom of the wiper arm in the rag (area around the mounting hole)
4. Insert the arm into vise being careful not to damage the arm itself (only insert aprox. 1-2" in vice) make sure to put into vice in the direction so its mounting hole is going horizontal (not up and down.)
5. Next, ( !! Be Careful !! ) bend the arm in the direction giving it more down force onto the windshield. This will obviously depend on the way you put it into the vice, thus that's why I am not going to say push or pull.

In my case it only took one attempt at each of the three wiper arms... yes, I did the rear one also. If you are not sure as to how much to bend it, take your time. It will honestly not take very much of a bend at all to see a drastic improvement . What you have to remember is that you are at the bottom of the arm... whatever you bend is multiplied with every inch of the arm to the blade itself. Now go buy yourself some Bosch Micro Edge blades and your all set.

P.S. I am not responsible for anyone's broken wiper arms... they are soft, so be careful!

Additional comments:

I would recommend doing this in a warm environment, and perhaps heating the wiper arm with a heat-gun may help prevent it from snapping as easily? - Todd Taylor

Part 2: Buying Wiper Blades 1" too Long!

For those of you that like to get every last little bit out of your car, here's one for you! A while back shopping for windshield wiper blades I purchased some that were an inch too long... on purpose. The reason: It adds an extra 1/2" of wiper coverage to each side of the wiper blade thus covering that much more area on the windshield. I would suppose (depending on the vehicle) you may be able to get away with more, but for myself and my 90 Corrado that is about the maximum. Before you make a purchase, take a tape measure and see how extreme you can get... you may be suprised. Simple things sometimes make all the difference..

Part 3: Rain-X

I don't need to say much more than that. Rain-X rocks.

Enjoy,
Chris Lang