Should I pull my wipers away from the windshield when parked during a winter storm?

Question

When we are expecting snow storm and the vehicle is parked, do we pull out the wipers so they don’t touch the glass to avoid the freezing to the windshield? Or would that hurt the springs in the wiper and make it weaker for future use?

Answer 1

When one lives in places where it snows, even occasionally, they quickly learn to lift the wipers. If you go to a ski resort when the inclement weather is expected, you would see half of the vehicles with wipers pulled up. The other half are either do not have wipers that can be fixed up (in that case one is still advised to separate them from the glass somehow), or they are going to regret it when temperatures hit below freezing after the wet snowfall.

In my experience, doing so never had any noticeable negative implication on the wiper arm spring. In fact, I have not seen any car, new or old, whose wiping performance suffered when the new wipers were attached.

In case the wipers do get frozen to the windscreen, one must take extreme care not to tear them off as it could be done really easily, especially when the rubber is more brittle from the cold. The best solution sometimes is to pour warm water on them, if available. And if your car is covered in snow or ice, always check the wipers by hand as you clean it off, before using the wiper motor.

Answer 2

Regarding the effect of raising the wiper arms on the wiper arm springs: raising the wiper arms will not make the springs weaker for future use.

The only way that the springs could produce reduced force when the wiper arms are returned to their normal position is if the springs took a permanent "set" from being stretched. This can only happen one of two ways:

1. The springs were stretched beyond their material yield point and therefore experienced plastic deformation, which is permanent
2. The springs experienced significant material "creep", which can happen below the yield point

Both of these scenarios are extremely unlikely in the case of wiper arm springs. The wiper arms are designed to be raised and lowered, and the springs will stay well below the yield point throughout their range of motion, so point 1 does not apply. As for creep, this is a LOOONG term phenomenon, and would occur to some extent even when the wiper arms are down (the stretch of the springs isn't all that different between the up and down positions), so point 2 does not apply.

Therefore, feel free to put your wipers up. It won't hurt your springs.

For what it's worth, I grew up in a very snowy region, and it wasn't until I moved out of the serious snow belt that I started to see masses of cars with their wipers up in parking lots. I actually think it's kind of funny. I personally have no problems cleaning my windshield with the wipers down.

Answer 3

I live in Canada where we got often snow storm or freezing rain during winter, I never lift my wipers blades. It's clearly unnecessary for a snow storm, as you remove the snow from your car prior of activate your wipers.

But I can see my neighbors lifting theirs when freezing rain is forecasted, some even put cardboard on the windshield to avoid scraping the ice. When it's happen, I start the car, start scrapping the windows and the heat will melt ice around the wipers (some cars have windshield wiper defrosters). I make sure that my wipers blade are clean of any ice and I'm set to go.

Answer 4

I'm against lifting them. I've never had any trouble (nor caused any damage) breaking one loose with a scraper. I have, however, had a wiper arm break when it snapped back against the windshield (such as can happen with the wind that normally accompanies Winter storms).