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Hi

Its an ongoing issue for most of us but the C5 front wipers do seize from time to time and ther usual answer is WD40. I guess its partly my fault as the car is left stood for 4-5 days at a time. The diesel suffers the same problem, whats the best course of action? Change the motor, if so who had them in stock at a decent price non OEM is fine. Or do I just put some grease onto the linkage? Just wondered what everyone else has decided or experienced......

Just strip it down and clean and lubricate the linkages and spindles, I doubt the motor is kaput.

i soaked mine in WD40 for a few weeks and that worked for a while. They then ground to a halt. Seized solid. I stripped the linkage out and luckily the motor was okay. I replaced the linkage with a second hand one bought here - http://www.partsgateway.co.uk/ Was a reasonably easy job - hardest part was removing the wiper arms which were corroded on. Everything's fine now - one of the cheapest repairs on my RS6 - £30. Described with pics - see link in my signature

Good idea with the sig Malcolm

Huh, I thought partsgateway was one of those semi-scam sites. Looks like you had results with it, though.

Shoppinit wrote:Huh, I thought partsgateway was one of those semi-scam sites. Looks like you had results with it, though.

I hadn't heard or read that. I was mightily impressed. i've tried it for new and s/h parts. Stick in your requirements, get 3-4 offers / quotes back same day, place order, parts in a couple of days...

Cool. I'll give it a try.

bilko1 wrote:Just strip it down and clean and lubricate the linkages and spindles, I doubt the motor is kaput.

Like he said! Happened on both the RS6 and my old C5 A6 (and both on the drivers side spindle).

Sometimes they are so badly seized that it's very difficult to separate the parts to clean them up, I remember needing a crow bar at one point.

I got the wiper arms off and unseized them by oiling them and assisting them by hand so the motor didn't overwork. It is definitely the drivers side one. When the weather turns bad I will strip it down and get rid of corrosion as this is only a stop gap I reckon.

i had oiled and WD40'd mine over several weeks and the problem just came back (driver side as well). Buying a second hand linkage was the best 30quid I've spent on this car for a long time