I just finished driving my E on a long trip in a driving blizzard. I left NE Pennsylvania and it took 9 hours to reach New Hampshire. The snow just did not stop!

While my beloved E, soon to reach it's 1 year mark in my "fleet", performed exceptionally in the snow, the wipers left a LOT to be desired. Snow would build up on the blades, eventually forming an ice block that would lift the blade about an inch off the windshield rendering them useless. I had to make several stops to clear the problem.

My wife's car is a '99 Subaru Forester with a Winter Package. While the heated seats are nice, the real blessing is the electrical element that sits along the base of the windshield to heat up the blades. I would like to see this feature added to a future Element model. Any other clever ideas that Honda's engineers could come up with (heated washer fluid?) would be welcome as well.

Regards,
Paul D.

Wow, that sucks. I don't want heated wipers, personally. You should move South. It was 60 today.

Dan:

My wife is from Kentucky so I'm sure she'd love it if I took your suggestion ;-)

But, I thought people couldn't drive in the winter in New England, I can't imagine what Georgia would be like when you get an ice storm!

Regards,
Paul D.

:roll: Wow, I've been having issues with my wipers for a while now. I'm actually dreeding the winter snows here in Virginia only because I've not replaced them yet. :?

I hadn't had my E for 6 months yet, when I noticed that they weren't clearing the window very well during a heavy rain storm. Okay, I have a short temper and get frustrated easily. I got so upset, I pouted and cried about it to the other half.

He's been promising me for a few months now he'd change out my wiper blades. I LOVE the idea of heated wipers or even a Winter package that would allow for Heavy duty wiper blades. :)

I'm tired of changing out wipers every 6 months. It's frustrating!!!! :x

E On!

Kerri
AWD SOP E
Mastiffs On Board

Aha..I'm not alone in my wiper issue..I've only had my E about a month
and i'm having problems with the passenger side missing areas..The
blades seem fine..In fact up until the other day i had hadnt even had them
on much..But i gave a blast of fluid and hit the wipers and had an "island"
of stuf left on the passenger side..I hadnt even used the wipers to clean off
snow or ice or anything like that...Are these just extra sensative wipers?

Z

I fiddled (technical term!) with the wiper problem yesterday and
fixed it.I ran my finger along the blade and made sure there were no spaces when the wiper was in it's resting spot..I kinda limbered up the the
the joints on the whole wiper assembly as well by moving all of the joints
along the blade..And that fixed it..

Z

If this is a huge problem, you might want to try a product called "Hot Squirt". Basically, it's a metal tube you splice into the heater hose with a smaller metal tube wrapped around it. The washer fluid runs through the smaller tube, and is heated by the fluid running to the heater core.

I wasn't able to find a web site, (Googling "hot squirt" just returns a ton of porn sites) but I did find one on sale on Ebay:http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=6781&item=2453373965

I don't have one on my Element, but the one on my Dodge works great.

Cover the rubber with a paper towel and shoot some silicone lubricant or WD-40 on the joints of your wiper blade frames to keep them from freezing in either the curved or straight position. It's cheap, thin metal, and the joints don't have ball-bearings you know. They collect water, which freezes them in whatever shape they stopped in. You should all be grateful these things don't have vacuum powered wipers like '52 Chevy's, ya big bunch of babies! (Gentle chiding.) This is not a Honda Element problem - it's called the real world - everything is cheap and disposable now. But at the same time, what planet have people been living on where everything worked just like they expected it to, and now that they've bought Elements, the whole world is not working right?

:roll: