1955 bent windshield wiper arms???

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Victor Ingram
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1955 bent windshield wiper arms???

#1 Post by Victor Ingram »

Can someone post a picture of correct wiper arms and blades for a 55 please?
thank you in advance

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James Davies
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Re: 1955 bent windshield wiper arms???

#2 Post by James Davies »

This is the cabriolet on the Porsche stand at the Paris Salon in Sep 1954. The parallel-moving, articulated wipers in mid-1954 to 1955 were the same as far as I know.
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1954 paris salon.png

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James Davies
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Re: 1955 bent windshield wiper arms???

#3 Post by James Davies »

Btw Victor, I believe Stoddard/NLA makes a nice reproduction of this wiper arm and blade. They have it labeled as the pre-A and 356A wiper are and blade.

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Joris Koning
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Re: 1955 bent windshield wiper arms???

#4 Post by Joris Koning »

James,

As far as I know nobody makes a good reproduction of the rare late Pre-A wiper blades. I will try and dig some out tomorrow and post a picture.

J.
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Donald Zingg
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Re: 1955 bent windshield wiper arms???

#5 Post by Donald Zingg »

Here are some photos of the original style SWF wiper blade assembly for P-356 cars mid-1954 through 1955.
Last photo close up compares old original (ribbed) with currently available SWF replacement part.
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wiper blade OEM1f.jpg
wiper blade OEM1h.jpg
wiper blade OEM1d.jpg
wiperblade3.jpg

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Victor Ingram
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Re: 1955 bent windshield wiper arms???

#6 Post by Victor Ingram »

Don, I did not realize the 54/55 had ribbed wiper blades, pretty cool all of the nuances the pre-a had.
I probably should have asked more detailed questions when I started this thread. Let me start with the Wiper arms. These wiper arms I have had with this car for over 25 years, I don't know if they are correct or incorrect, hence the reasons for the questions. I am trying to get it right.
As you can see the wiper arms are (2) different lengths, 11 inches and 10.5 inches. Are they suppose to be the same length?
Do they have the correct "slight bend" for a pre-a?
The bases of the arms are long, is that correct?

The wiper blades as Dons pictures suggest are ribbed, as you can see the ones I have posted are not.
But are they correct length?
The box shows a 1964 date, almost 9 years after the car was built.
Thanks in advance for the input.
Attachments
IMG_1143.jpg
IMG_1142.jpg
IMG_1141.jpg
IMG_1140.jpg
Last edited by Victor Ingram on Tue Apr 12, 2016 3:09 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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Spencer Harris
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Re: 1955 bent windshield wiper arms???

#7 Post by Spencer Harris »

Victor,
I have one set of SWF arms purchased from Stoddard in 1986 ($14.20 for the pair - 10% PCA discount) for my '55 coupe. Both arms are 260mm/10" - measured from the female post housing to the tip of the arm. I may have my original arms in a box somewhere, and if I run across them I will edit with photos.
I have two sets of circa August '64 blades ($13.50 per pair in '86; somewhat more in 2013) that are identical to what you posted. I don't remember ever seeing the ribbed version that Don posted, but that will be an inspiration to dig through my old junk boxes - and to keep an eye out for them. I don't have wiper arms for my '53 yet - still holding out for the $14 price point... :wink:
55_40DSC_0003.jpg
55_40DSC_0004.jpg
55_40DSC_0001.jpg
53_40DSC_0001.jpg
Spencer Harris
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Victor Ingram
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Re: 1955 bent windshield wiper arms???

#8 Post by Victor Ingram »

Spencer great info, thank you.

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Joris Koning
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Re: 1955 bent windshield wiper arms???

#9 Post by Joris Koning »

It looks like Don has beat me to the punch. Attached some pictures of my blades. I believe two sizes were used but need to double check my SWF literature. The large size shown is not a Porsche blade but something picked up in my travels. The chrome blades are the exact same size as the Porsche ones but appear to have been used on a different car
Attachments
IMG_3330.JPG
IMG_3329.JPG
IMG_3328.JPG
IMG_3327.JPG
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James Davies
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Re: 1955 bent windshield wiper arms???

#10 Post by James Davies »

Thanks for sharing Joris. The 1950 to mid-'54 Bosch wiper arms were 210mm long (from pivot) and had 230mm blades, so I suspect that the SWF ones would have been similar size for coupes and cabs? Not sure.

The Speedster supplement for the 1955 Parts book states the following sizes, which would apply to '54-55 cars:

wiper arm without blade: 225mm long
SWF wiper blade: 260mm

No sizes for the coupe/cab are listed.

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Donald Zingg
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Re: 1955 bent windshield wiper arms???

#11 Post by Donald Zingg »

Victor,

The wiper arm with the long bracket in your photo looks like the style that originally came on my '59 Karmann Ghia.
The wiper arm with the short bracket is VW Beetle from the same era.
Porsche also used the same length short bracket on cars with solid-blade, opposite-parking wipers.
When Porsche changed over to the articulated wiper blade design in 1954 the arm bracket also grew a bit longer, though not as long as the bracket in your photo. If you must chose between the two you have on hand, go with the shorter bracket design.

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Donald Zingg
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Re: 1955 bent windshield wiper arms???

#12 Post by Donald Zingg »

Hi James,

Your suspicions are correct - - -
These blade frames are from a mid-1955 pre-A Cabriolet.
The length measurement is pretty close to the earlier blade length.
Attachments
wiper blade OEM1a.jpg

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Joris Koning
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Re: 1955 bent windshield wiper arms???

#13 Post by Joris Koning »

I did some more research in some period SWF catalogs I have. The 230mm blade is indeed listed for both cab and coupe. SWF lists these as being used from March 54 onwards. The catalog lists 260mm blades for the Speedster. According to SWF these were used up to February of '57. This would imply that the pickle fork blades were phased in later for Speedsters compared to coupe's and cabs. I am sure Don can elaborate further on this.
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IMG_3337.JPG
IMG_3338.JPG
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James Davies
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Re: 1955 bent windshield wiper arms???

#14 Post by James Davies »

Thanks Don and Joris!

And Joris, that's the first indication I've seen that SWF was a supplier for the April '54 and earlier Porsches. Of the few existing cars that still have their original wiper blades, mostly I've seen Bosch, which had an almost identical design. Nice to see that SWF also made chrome-plated blades of the same size. Porsche switched from the Bosch wiper motor to the SWF BSW 2405 pictured in your catalog for the 1953 model year. With it, I imagine they could have switched to an equivalent-look SWF wiper blade. That said, I've seen '53 cars as late as March '53 have the Bosch wiper blades, though I guess they could have been replacements from old stock at the dealer. Very cool.

For completeness in this thread, here's the diagram and table on the Bosch wipers from 1952, plus a comparison with the shorter SWF wipers used on VW Beetles during the period. These or the SWF ones pictured in Joris' catalog above were used through April 1954 with the opposite-motion wiper actuation.
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wipers_vw_top_356_bottom.jpg
wischblatt.png

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Donald Zingg
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Re: 1955 bent windshield wiper arms???

#15 Post by Donald Zingg »

Joris,

Thanks so much for posting those SWF catalog pages. XLNT info!
There are references in the 356A Spare Parts Catalog and P-Service Bulletin 21/57 about changing the wiper motor design in March 1957 from Bowden cable-controlled to a motor controlled by electric switch, but I have not seen any factory info noting when the wiper arms changed to the pickle fork design. For Speedsters it was at some point after chassis 82256 (April 1956) - - - -

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