I drive a 1989 Volvo 240 DL Wagon.

The other day my area had the first rain of any significance in at least three months. My commute to work is roughly 20 minutes long. After about ten minutes of driving through the heavy rain, my front windshield wipers stopped working. They parked in the right place, but no matter the speed setting, they no longer move.

They stopped working around the same time I turned my headlights off (I had finished driving through a headlights required area), but as I had the wipers set to the lowest speed, I don't know if it was at the exact same time, or merely a coincidence.

My headlights and hazards still work, and my rear windshield wiper still works as well.

How do I diagnose this as definitely a problem with the motor? What should I be looking for before taking my car into the shop? (Or maybe the fix is something relatively simple, I could do myself?)

I checked the fuses. There was no sign of water leakage or corrosion on the fuses, and rotating the fuse for the wiper did nothing.

When I tried to move one wiper blade by hand, the other wiper blade moves as well. (In my search for diagnosis, I have seen other posts mention whether or not this is the case.) I was only able to get the blades to each wiggle a bit, not pull across the entire windshield.

Any help would be greatly appreciated! It rains a lot in my area (and rain is in the forecast for the next several days), so I would like to get this taken care of as quickly as possible.

 

i'd probably start with a volt meter across the connector that the wiper motor is plugged into, the motor is in engine compartment on the firewall on the passenger side.

if there is juice, the problem is going to be the motor. to remove the motor, you first need to remove the glovebox from the inside of the car so you can disconnect the linkage. I forget all the specifics, this job (for my daughter's 240) is on my 'honey-do' list as her wipers are slow and erratic, another sign of needing a new motor.

 

Just as Pierce said, check to make sure that you have voltage going to the motor. If there is voltage, the motor may have gone bad. I had one fail on our '90 240. Found that one of the magnets in the motor had come loose. I glued the magnet back on with some JB Weld and it works fine again.

 

Try to tap the motor, same thing happens to me I give it a tap and it starts working. I'll have to replace motor but keep on forgeting.