Electric Wiper Door-Believe it or not!

[69MyWay]

After nearly 12 hours of trial and error-emphasis on error, I now have an electric powered wiper door! :cool

I built a mock up of the firewall housing out of a 2x4 and other hardware. Mounted the wiper door mechanism on that in the bench vice and started working my different ideas. The nice thing is, I only made one permanent change to the factory wiper door bracket assembly, but it can't even be seen as it is under the back side of where the old vacuum actuator would have mounted.

The electric motor is 1/4 the size of the old vacuum actuator. In fact, you could dremel a hole in the front of the vacuum actuator and slide it over the electric motor to have a stock appearance.

I have not mounted it in the car yet, but there is no doubt it will work there just as well.

Now, I have to engineer the wiring. I know I can set it up on a seperate switch (power door lock style switch) and use the factory grounding bolt so the wiper motor can not run unless the door is all the way up. However ,since I am this far into it, I want to come up with a self contained unit that will trigger everything by simply turning on the wipers.

Stay tuned, I will keep you posted. I will snap some pics and update them to my photo point account.

Next -- Electric headlights! :s

 

[silver 80]

elcetric wiper door and head light

That's cool i don't know why this wasn't done before. just have to find some encasement from the weather.
So when is production?
tom

 

[Scott81]

Chris,

Sounds like you're pretty good with mechanical stuff, keep us posted. You might want to look into manufacturing something, who knows you just might hit that pot of gold.

 

[silver 80]

elctrical

I agree with scott.
you know all of the vette parts mags will carry it. go for the pat.
tom

 

[69MyWay]

Thanks guys,

There is a very interesting story behind what led to my discovery of the "perfect" electric components to attempt this conversion. I happened to find the compenents years ago in the back cubby of a C4 we bought for my wife. I remember wondering what they were and why were they in the back compartment of her car. We bought it from a wholesale lot, and had no history on the prior owner. I still don't know what they were doing in there.

Fast forward to this weekend. I have had this design on my mind for years. It did not make any sense to pursue it as I was far from ready to make an installation. This 69 project was just the thing. Originally I had plans to only go electric on the headlights and skip the wiper door in favor of a long hood. However, I got such a good deal on my L88 short hood that I could not pass it up.

Today I set up the basic brackets and parts for the headlight. It works perfect. In fact, I am able to use most of the original wiring for the vacuum modules to trigger up and down action. Just one relay per should do the trick.

Anyway, I am getting ahead of myself. I have contacted the manufacture of these motors and am waiting to find out if they are still available. If so, I am going to pick up a couple of extra in the event of a failure while out and about.

Yes, I have considered the marketing opportunity. Don't think I could ever get rich, but it would be nice to have a little extra pocket change.

No worries about the weather bothering these motors. They are fully sealed with solid aluminum bodies. I think a polished aluminum or chrome shield would be a nice touch.

Like I said before though, you could dremel out the vacuum canister for either the headlight or wiper motor and protect the electric unit in there while retaining a stock look.

It will be another week or two until I can mount it all up on the car and watch the motion take place there. I will keep you posted.

 

[bhays]

Man, I can't tell you how happy I am to hear about this. I was in on the electric headlight deal on the other forum and I am still wanting to do this. I am eager to hear about your design!

 

[69MyWay]

Welcome to the CAC.

It is true. However, I need to get the entire system up and running for some extended period of time before presenting it as a solution for anybody. I have debated simply buying a running cheap ragged out C3 for the soul purpose of rigging it up and getting some miles on the design. However, my plate is very full right now. I passed on a basket case 72 considering there is too much work for the money, and my buddy is selling his 77 (see market place above), so there is no sense rigging that car up (plus he is selling for more than I would want to spend on a test mule). I am sure I will bring more details on this to everybody in the coming months. As you see from my sig pic, the car is still in a million pieces.


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