so I had to wait until it stopped raining to get the car back to my new house

it was very cold and wet still

the next day was sunny so I attempted a drive to keep moving stuff, smelled burning and thought it was the lousy neighbourhood I was driving through, then a few blocks later I reached under and felt the wiper motor just to make sure, OUCH, extremely hot! and I was not even using the wipers (why would it be getting hot if the switch is not pulled?)

and as I was reminiscing about touching the hot iron my mother told me not to touch as a kid, smoke started billowing out of the dash!

I turned the car off immediately and put it in neutral and coasted to the curb as quickly as possible and then pulled the battery leads

I then pulled all the wires off the wiper switch and stood back and waited to see if a fire had actually started

lesson learned: that 10B-C fire extinguisher I bought the other day will only work if I leave it in the car!

so looks like my wiring harness has many flaws (no driving lights unless I hook 2 wires up under the dash, wiper motor cooked possibly)

any one ever buy the new wiring harnesses available from Vintage Imports in Vancouver, BC

any other options? tired of second guessing old stereo installation wires etc

thanks for all the help

What happened to yours is exactly hwat happened to mine a few weeks back. There are three or four screws that hold the motor to the wiring assembly... Them screws backed out, and the motor fell off, the crank got jammed, and the motor can't get past the jam, but even if the wipers are off, that motor is trying as hard as it can to park the wipers.

First thing you gotta do is kill the power source, which is easiest done by disconnecting the switch. Of course, be sure to mark where the wires go.

Only solution is to remove the whole wiper assembly, replace the screws... of course, bench test the motor to insure you didn't cook it.

-Matt
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-Matt '70 145s, '65 1800s, '66 122s wagon, others inc. '53 XK120 FHC

Well Im not too familiar with our wiper motors, but since it is in essance an eletric motor, it should generate some heat but if it's very hot to the touch, then something is wrong. The motor might be completely fried. If the wiring follows normal wiring convention, the green should be the ground red is usually pos and black neg or common. My guess (I would look it up 1st before you try any of this, I know there is somewhere with a wiring diagram online, Im at work atm so I cant look it up) is that the green is chassie ground, red positive terminal or to wiper switch, black neg terminal or another part of the switch. Im guessing (this is pretty much a shot in the dark) that since the switch is "varible" its probally 3 resistors in parallel and when it is pulled out it makes contact with one of the 3, there for limiting the voltage to the motor, thus causing different "speeds". If you have access to a varible DC powers supply I would connect the green to a ground then red to pos terminal, black to neg and slowy increase the voltage up to a max of say 10V (just for testing purposes)I would clean off all contacts as it might not be making a good connect/ground resulting in improper voltage causing excessive heat. Now was the sound a "clunk" or a pop? Clunk would probally denote something mechanical either braking within the motor make causing a short also a source of heat, vs a pop is electrical, atleast from my experience. Hope this "shotgun" post helps in some manner and hopefully someone more knowledgeable will reply as well. Good Luck
-Alan

EDIT: After looking at the diagram link I posted below, disguard my idea on the green wire, all 3 of them go to the switch...green goes to the "P" terinal, black on the "A" and red on the "F", that is if your wiring is stock. One lead from the P on the switch should go to the 25Amp fuse on the block (no1 according to diagram....hope this helps