Owning a G20 means eventually your windshield wipers will become noisy, squeaky or squealing contraptions. The noise is from bad wiper pivot bushings not bad wiper blades. Though, you might need new wiper blades too.
Several people have offered their advice and experience repairing or replacing the wiper arm pivots. I’ll include that here along with some pictures that I haven’t seen elsewhere.
There are two challenges to this job:
1. The nuts that hold the pivots are often rusted, so you will destroy the bolts when removing the pivots. This is why you are best served by having new replacements to install.
2. The wiper arms are often stuck to the pivot shaft.
WARNING: Be careful removing the wiper arms. The wiper arms can be tough to remove and prying them off will almost certainly result in a broken windshield. Guess how I know this.
New wiper arm pivots are available from your favorite on line Infiniti parts dealer for $30 – 35 each. This is the best choice, but I’ll also show you how to disassemble the pivots, clean and re-grease. I suspect that if you use a silicone based grease (Wagner disc brake grease or similar) they will last a long time without need for replacement. I suggest silicone grease because it will not deteriorate the plastic bushing like petroleum based grease.
1. Remove plastic cap from wiper arm pivot. Using a tiny screwdriver pop the plastic cap from the wiper arm connection. There is a notch in the wiper arm to make this easy.
2. Unscrew the nut from the pivot arm. IIRC it is a 12mm nut.
3. Remove the wiper arms. Remember my warning above. Best advice from earlier posts is to use one hand to press the wiper arm down at the hinge (a few inches from the pivot) while pulling up with your other hand from the pivot. This worked great on one side, but not on the other. DO NOT PRY WITH A SCREW DRIVER OR PRY BAR. If you can be patient spray with PB Blaster and wait. You might get lucky. Applying heat with a torch would probably work, but is problematic because you will melt the plastic vent cover. If the arm does not pop off get a small two arm gear puller or battery post puller. K-D tools makes a fine version of both these tools. Both tools are stocked at Sears and cost about $20. See here and here . The gear puller especially is handy for many other jobs, so worth the investment.
4. The plastic vent cover is held by two Phillips head screws and several trim pressure pins. Remove the screws and then gently pull the plastic cover.
5. Before you remove the pivots you can disconnect the wiper linkage shafts. The linkage shafts are metal with plastic sockets that are pressed onto metal balls (ball and socket joint) at the pivots. These should pop apart with a pull or a little prying with your hand. Remove one linkage shaft that connects the right arm to the left arm. Just remove at the right (center) pivot the connection from the shaft that comes from the wiper motor. This way you can’t confuse the linkage shafts when you go to install.
6. There are three nuts that hold the pivot. Mine were so rusted I had to cut two bolts on one pivot and one on the other. A Dremel or similar tool with a small metal cut off wheel works great. This is also why you should have either new or salvage yard pivots ready to replace yours.
7. Reverse the directions if you have new pivots to install.
Assuming you did not destroy the pivots you can take them apart, clean and re-grease.
There is a snap ring on top that you will struggle with. I found a right angle pick could get behind the ring and then you could carefully pry with a screwdriver to move it up and off the shaft without deforming it too badly.
Here is the wiper pivot disassembled. Washers etc. are in the order they line up on the pivot shaft.
Use silicone grease on the pivot shaft (Wagner silicone caliper brake grease or similar).
Pivot assembled:
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Originally Posted by dytrdr1028
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