Help! No wipers, front or rear!

[moparman58]

About six months ago the front wipers on my '97 T&C w/97,000 miles quit working. Didn't notice for a while, but then discovered the rear wiper wasn't working, either. Checked all the fuses and swapped out relays, but didn't make any difference. Took it to my mechanic and, after testing, they said it was the BCM. Chose to do nothing right then as replacing it with a new one would be more than the vehicle is worth.

Pulled the BCM two months ago and sent it off for testing and repair. The people I sent it to returned it stating they had tested it six ways to Sunday and there was nothing wrong with it. Put it back in and still have no wipers. Also changed out the multi-function stalk, which did nothing.

I'm kind of stuck on where to go from here. I have a used BCM and have read that resistor #409 has a tendency to run open, so an option would be to throw in the used BCM to see if that is the problem, then solder in a new resistor and put the original BCM back in.

But I'd rather check anything else that might be the problem before crawling under the dash and tearing things apart again. Does anyone know exactly where the ground connections would be for the wiper circuits? Seems to me a bad ground could be the cause. Or does anyone have any other ideas of where to look?

Thanks!

Mike

[RIP]

As labeled on a wire diagram, the front wiper motor ground is at the G200 left cowl ground panel. I can only assume it's in the wiper cowl on the driver's side. The rear wiper motor ground is at the G400 lift gate ground block. Must be in the lift gate near the motor. Have you tried to apply power directly from the battery to the motors to verify they work?

http://ricksfreeautorepairadvice.com...iper-problems/

[moparman58]

Originally Posted by RIP

As labeled on a wire diagram, the front wiper motor ground is at the G200 left cowl ground panel. I can only assume it's in the wiper cowl on the driver's side. The rear wiper motor ground is at the G400 lift gate ground block. Must be in the lift gate near the motor. Have you tried to apply power directly from the battery to the motors to verify they work?

http://ricksfreeautorepairadvice.com...iper-problems/

My mechanic did for the front wipers and the motor worked, looking at the dirt swipes on the windshield when I picked it up. I haven't tried it for the rear wipers. I just find it odd that both wouldn't be working at the same time. I'm not too worried about the rear one, as I rarely ever use it, but the front ones are a necessity. So far I've been getting by using my other car whenever the weather is bad, which isn't that often here in AZ. Anyway, my next step is to check the grounds, though I doubt that is the problem.

[moparman58]

Posted this a long time ago, so here's the update on what happened. I eventually got tired of not having wipers, so installed the used BCM to see what would happen. Voila! Working wipers again, both front and rear. Tried soldering a new relay in the original BCM, but apparently I need three hands to do it and gave up. So I decided to just leave this one in and live with the very increased mileage, as it would cost almost as much as the van is worth to put in a new one and get it programmed. The real mileage is around 101K, so I'll probably have it for a long time until something else breaks that is more than it is worth.