DIY: Repairing a broken wiper arm nut on my Skoda Rapid

I broke this wiper nut 4 years back when my car was brand new and I was fiddling with wiper for some do-it-yourself task.

BHPian any23 recently shared this with other enthusiasts.

Long story cut to short - So, I broke this wiper nut 4 Years back when my car was brand new and I was fiddling with wiper for some do it yourself task.

Back then it was simply glued by me with the help of araldite (industrial glue) and the wiper was working fine since then, till recently when a stone chip on highway leading to windshield crack beyond repair. As it was evident that windshield must be replaced at the earliest for safety point of view I left my car at Skoda Service Center on 09/04/2022 for windshield replacement, it completely slipped out of my mind to inform the advisor regarding the broken bolt which holds the wiper arm it was so because the wiper worked fine till then, soon I got communication from service advisor that sir the bolt & nut for driver side wiper arm is already broken with the below shared images as a proof from his end stating it was not their fault.

I politely acknowledged that this is in my knowledge and it was due to my mistake that it happened so, I enquired possible solutions to fix the issue and finally got to know that they don't repair this and the whole wiper assembly has to be replaced which will add approximately INR 19,000/- to my bill.

I asked them to make it the way it was fixed before (well elaborated by me) to which they agreed. After a hectic day at office I collected my car from the service center during late evening hours, and in a hurry burry forgot to check the functionality of the wiper arm, drove to home parked my car in the garage and took sigh of relief that a long pending windshield replacement is complete, unaware of the fact what is going to unfold in the coming few days.

Fast forward to 14/04/2022, that day we (family & friends) had a planned brunch drive to city outskirts. I was in my garage and was busy with routine dusting of the car for the drive and when I tried lifting the wiper arm for dusting windshield the wiper arm came off from the stud. It was then when I realized that I had done a thorough check of the car before delivery but skipped the wiper check, so I was left with a dangling and dancing wiper arm.

As per the advice of various threads here on this forum I tried searching for a solution for the issue with a known local FNG and they were of the same view that the nut is broken and nothing can be done to repair this, replacement of the assembly is the only way possible. But deep within I knew this can be very well repaired if someone just want to devote some time and effort to do so, took my car back to my home garage parked it and I thought of possible solutions to the issue, one way was to do it the way it was done by me first time, but I myself was not satisfied with the way it was done the first time around even though the wiper worked fine after that.

Finally, it was decided that the same size bolt and nut will be procured from local market, the bolt will be cut to similar length required and will be glued to the stud and wiper arm will be fixed with the help of nut.

The bolt and nut required for the repair

Bolt cut to required length

Attempt 1 - trying to fix bolt on the stud with help of industrial glue

The final result was satisfactory and the glued bolt has enough strength (tried fiddling with it but it held its place), but wiper arm had very tight fitting to the stud, so it was required to cut the extra glue from the sides for the wiper arm to slide in, in the process the bolt lost its strength and came off while tightening the nut, this lead to failed Attempt-1.

Attempt 2 - This time I decided to push fit the wiper arm first, then glue the bolt to the stud, and it worked, extra glue was applied around the bolt to give it added strength.

Applied glue to the nut and tightened it firmly and left it to cure

The wiper is working fine, still I believe better attempt can be made to make the stud and bolt a better entity. Whenever time permits I have planned to drill central holes on both stud and bolt so that they can be glued with help of connecting rod, which will lead to a permanent fix to the issue.

Read BHPian comments for more insights and information.