Wipers on 2008 Kountry Star

[FreeRain]

Having trouble with wipers on Kountry Star. The two nuts on the pass through tube going through the front cowling keep coming loose. This allows the right wiper to go past center on the control arm and gets stuck below the windshield which causes the fuse to blow on the wiper circuit. Does anyone have a cure for this problem? Or has anyone else seen this problem? Need help since the service people can't seem to solve it.

[tmitchell]

Have you tried putting Loctite on the threads. It keeps nuts and bolts from shaking loose on Harleys, so it should surely work on an RV.
Tom

[imgoin4it]

I have gotten so good driving in the rain without wipers that I don't think they should even be installed on motor homes with one peice windshields. We have had our 2007 KSDP for 1 1/2 years and the wipers have been worked on under warranty 6 or 7 times at numerous places. They are now better than ever but I still do not trust them on anything other than intermittent. Especially do not try to operate them on high. They probably will wrap around and stick. The nut to which you refer is supposed to be torqued to 25 FP's (I believe). It needs to be re-torqued after each short time of use-(at least for a few times). Mine have yet to work long enough for me to re-torque them. I think they might work a little better then ever before, but have not been in any rain to find out. I believe the wiper arm and blade is too heavy and the sweep is too much. I plan on visiting the factory next spring and one of my questions will be, can the linkage be adjusted so that the sweep can be reduced. I am also going to experament to see if I can adapt a 28 inch lighter weight blade to the existing arms. If you figure out a way to make them work with any degree of reliability please post it. Best of luck, but learn how to get along with out them.

[Route 66]

Newmar installed a longer piece of linkage on my rig, which reduced the travel of the arm. I know it sounds backwards but that's what they said.

When the cone nut comes loose, the splines get stripped and the nut must be replaced.

Newmar recommends torquing the wiper nuts regularly. One of our members just left the factory and said Newmar recommended 38 ft lbs.

I too have been considering 28" blades.

[FreeRain]

Quote:

Originally Posted by imgoin4it I have gotten so good driving in the rain without wipers that I don't think they should even be installed on motor homes with one peice windshields. We have had our 2007 KSDP for 1 1/2 years and the wipers have been worked on under warranty 6 or 7 times at numerous places. They are now better than ever but I still do not trust them on anything other than intermittent. Especially do not try to operate them on high. They probably will wrap around and stick. The nut to which you refer is supposed to be torqued to 25 FP's (I believe). It needs to be re-torqued after each short time of use-(at least for a few times). Mine have yet to work long enough for me to re-torque them. I think they might work a little better then ever before, but have not been in any rain to find out. I believe the wiper arm and blade is too heavy and the sweep is too much. I plan on visiting the factory next spring and one of my questions will be, can the linkage be adjusted so that the sweep can be reduced. I am also going to experament to see if I can adapt a 28 inch lighter weight blade to the existing arms. If you figure out a way to make them work with any degree of reliability please post it. Best of luck, but learn how to get along with out them.

Thanks for the comeback, guys. Intermittent is the only way I will run them now since I have had so much trouble. I also have been wondering about going to smaller blades because the pressure spring doesn't seem strong enough to hold the large blades against the windshield. At least on the driver's side. I had a 2007 3916 and the wipers worked perfect. Now it seems like everything that worked fine on the 2007 doesn't work on the 2008. Love the Comfort Steer though.

[Robsons]

I can't tell you how relieved i am to hear that I'm not the only one with this problem. Just picked up our brand new Allstar 4154 2 weeks ago and drove it 20 minutes down the road when the wipers conked out at 60 MPH in a driving rainstorm. Passenger side wiper went haywire and popped the fuse after getting stuck underneath the driver side wiper. Considering that this was my first time driving a Class A 41' bus, you can imagine that I was freaking out!! I was having enough anxiety about staying in my lane as it was.

After the 4th time of this happening, I finally found an exit with an Ace hardware store where I bought an adjustable wrench and (in the pouring rain) figured out that I could tighten the nuts holding the wiper axle into the front surface of the MH. (I had flown out to pick up MH and didn't have any tools w me.)

Later on the driver's side wiper went off the edge of the glass and got stuck off the side of the windshield. OY! So I retighted again. Did i mention that it rained 3 days straight?

We were already planning to stop by Newmar factory for a tour and got a very nice fella to take a look. Apparently there's a replacement to be made but they didn't have any in stock and just retightened the existing nuts. They had to do touchup paint on the metal beam running alongside the winshield due to scratches from the wiper blade assembly. I think the splines on the passenger side are a bit dinged up so i may need to request a replacement there too.

Thankfully we were able to get home from there without any rain!

It's been two weeks since that drama. Haven't received the replacement parts yet but was assured this week they are on order.

I think thread lock could be a big help or perhaps a bellville washer or something like that. But, I'm a bit concerned that making the nut super tight will just transfer the forces somewhere else (sheet metal of front of MH or some other part of wiper linkages, etc).

["007"]

Welcome FreeRain to the Newmar forum and irv2.
As you can see your not alone the wiper's have been headaches for many.
Enjoy the forums and DO post often.

[FreeRain]

Quote:

Originally Posted by "007" Welcome FreeRain to the Newmar forum and irv2. As you can see your not alone the wiper's have been headaches for many. Enjoy the forums and DO post often.

Thanks. Glad I'm not the only one having trouble with the wipers. I just backed off the nuts and applied thread lock to all four nuts and retightened to 38fp. Still doesn't seem tight enough but maybe with the thread lock it will work. Thanks, everyone for all the help and comebacks.

[RVDude]

Let me re-iterate an important part of that 38 ft-lbs torque on that (should be a nylock style) nut. First - DO NOT EVER OVER-TIGHTEN. The trick is that you MUST repeat that torque every couple hours for a day or two. No kidding. Really. This is the step that is always forgotten and never talked about. Not even all the Newmar techs do it. Here's why. As the metal splines of the harder metal knurled mount digs into the softer metal of the wiper arm itself, it needs re-tightening. The arm will continue to re-seat on the knurling many times before it slows down/stops. As it re-seats, it becomes lose again. Repeat this re-torque step maybe a half to a dozen times (you can not rush it!) before use and you'll be A-OK. I also re-torque after several heavy rain uses. Never had a slip since.

The nut should look like this

[FreeRain]

RVDude: thanks for the info and tip. my problem is with the nuts on the inner and outer side of the tube running through the front cowling (fiberglass) that the wiper shaft goes through. this tube acts as a separate bushing for each wiper shaft. your nut mounts on the wiper shaft itself and secures the wiper arm to the splined wiper shaft. I have no trouble with the wiper arms coming loose. almost wish I did. thanks.

[Robsons]

Quote:

Originally Posted by FreeRain RVDude: thanks for the info and tip. my problem is with the nuts on the inner and outer side of the tube running through the front cowling (fiberglass) that the wiper shaft goes through. this tube acts as a separate bushing for each wiper shaft. your nut mounts on the wiper shaft itself and secures the wiper arm to the splined wiper shaft. I have no trouble with the wiper arms coming loose. almost wish I did. thanks.

FreeRain - I have the same issue. It's the big hex nuts on the inside and outside of the fiberglass that get loose and let the entire wiper assembly wobble and over-rotate. I have a new set of parts coming in from Newmar which shoudl be here in another day or two. I'll post the results.

[FreeRain]

Robsons: thanks for your input and I will be waiting to see your results. Also, I'm interested in what the relacement parts from Newmar will be. Please keep me posted.

FreeRain

[Robsons]

OK. So Newmar sent me a replacement wiper linkage assembly. It's basically the joint that transmits the motion from the rotating mechanism inside the internal compartment out to the wiper arm. I can take a photo if you want to see it.

Only took me about 30 minutes to replace and wasn't too complicated at all. The two definite things I noticed that are different is that they included a star washer with the large hex nut that gets mounted to the inside of the pass through hole in the fiberglass. This should stop the hex nuts from getting loose.

Also, the swing arm that translates the side-to-side motion of the main drive arm to the rotating motion of the wiper arm is now longer. This means that that the wiper won't go through as large an arc which should keep it from over-rotating.

These two changes may be enough. Haven't had to drive anywhere yet with the fix in place. I was going to put threadlock on as well too but figured I'd wait and see what happens with these changes first.

Now, all I have to do is call them and ask for the second assembly for the other wiper. Why they didn't send me two replacements, I have no idea...

[FreeRain]

Robsons: Thanks a bunch for letting me know what Newmar's fix would be. I have thought that a longer arm on the inside of the wiper might just be the thing we need since it would reduce the travel of the wiper itself which, as you stated, would (could) prevent over-rotation. I still haven't driven in a rain since using the thread lock so don't know if I still have a problem or not. I'm sure it is still there waiting to surface in the middle of a blinding rain storm. Pleae let me know if you have any more problems with the Newmar fix. Thanks.