@wonkipop @Van B @jeffbowlsby
At this weekend's Northeast Gathering there were some ad-hoc discussions about whether the "bent" wiper arm went on the driver's side or the passenger's side. A survey of 20-something cars showed about 60% on the passenger's side, 40% on the driver's side and 1 with no wipers (Nick uses RainX).
Here are some pics of the parts list (from AA website), showing the bent on the passenger side, mine (also on the passenger side) and the 1974 sales brochure sort of (?) showing it on the driver's side. I've had mine off only once and am fairly sure I took them off one at a time (to respray) before putting back on.
Thus, I'd conclude that the bent belongs on the passenger side although geometrically it seems to "fit" better on the driver's side. However, the bent angle would reduce the driver's visual interference when on the passenger side.
Your thoughts on this admitted minutia?
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Had to go check. I'm running a bent one on the passenger side/straight on the driver side. Both on a very original windshield

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I won't be of any help with this one but I wanted to add something to this discussion. When I first joined here there was a brief discussion as to the correct angle that the WW arms should be located. IIRC, the drivers side was raised more than the right side arm. Any input on that aspect?

Ok; seems to agree and be a consistent data point.
Thanks!

Yes; maybe one sprocket higher. That’s why geometrically the bent one sits better when on the drivers side. To clear the edge the straight one is just a tad higher. See the first photo of my (green) car above.

Yeah, my driver side could go up a notch, too.

For all 914 things unknown...Haynes comes to our rescue. But 914 life gets more complicated the more we know and don't know...

ah the mysteries of the 914. thanks mr. b.


my 74 in 89/now.

never changed them. original screen.
work in rhd too left in original format, can tell you that.

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had a scan through the factory workshop manual.
its all in there too. never noticed before about the earlier cars.
PET catalogue makes it clear a very heavy revision of entire motor assembly was done at the same time.

slightly OT but on topic when it comes to the mysteries of porsche.
this one will get you scratching your heads.

normally a rhd 911 looks like this.
mirrored wipers to a lhd 911.

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but not this one.
belongs to an old mate of mine.
he has had it since new.
75 911S australian delivery, rhd.

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it drove out of the showroom this way.
wrong way wipers fitted at the factory.
he's had 50 years worth of porsche know alls telling him his wipers are wrong and he has messed up his car.
the only thing he has done is replace the original chrome side mirror that some drunk vandal wrenched around (a popular 80s pastime amongst mullet haircut bogans).

the general view is they ran out of right hand drive wiper assemblies the day they put this car together in stuttgart, so they just stuck a lhd set in and sent it off to the far flung colonies?

or.....it was oktoberfest

@StarBear .

more aus wiper trivia.
think i may be allowed to put this up now as car has been published in story by @gulf908 .

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i have to get hold of this magazine.
think you can only buy it via their website or subscribe.
mag called "duck and whale".

dennis (gulf908) researched and wrote the article.
about the 2 original sixes that came into aus in the 1970s via the australian porsche distributor. the distributor did not bring any 4s in for market assessment.

the mythical missing 914/6 that i used to hear about in the 80s and 90s has been restored and is on the road again. there were two 6s originally. an old mate of mine (b.c) who founded version 1 of the 914 register in the 90s owned the other one.
dennis will have the story.

check out the wipers.

mythical other 6. (think its ok to put this photo up now gulf sent).
owner has done a magnificent job.
converted to rhd way back when.
magazine looks like its going to have a lot of sylish pics of it.

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the car that used to be owned by b. c.
converted to rhd way back when (but where?).
this one is tangerine color.

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i'm sure the wipers tell a story about the two different cars.
dennis will have filled us in with his article.

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I think it's been pretty well confirmed here that the bent arm is the passenger side, but here is some supporting evidence.

I know it's the case for VW, seems also for Porsche part numbers, driver side parts the last of the 9 digit base part number is odd and the passenger side is even.

Here's a nos 914 628 314 (with the bend) - even number would be passenger side

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Awesome! That nails it! Thanks.

Quote from an old thread that I copied and saved follows my own experience story.
I've owned a few 914s including one new in 1973. I swear the wipers were switched on half of the cars. I don't like the end of the driver side wiper blade to touch the chrome windscreen trim like a couple of mine did when I bought the car, so I switched them. One had the wiper blades completely reversed to rest on the passenger side out of the driver's view and I liked that. Anyway I agree that the bent arm should be on the passenger side in a normal setup, but then I found this discussion thread and I think it explained why a couple of mine violated my rule of not letting the rubber touch the chrome.

Begin quote:
Cal -

IIRC there was some issue with one or more batches of the OEM wiper arms being mfgd. a few mm's too long on the DS ones, ergo the overlap in the DS one in your pic above. AFAIR the position you have above is about right, but the wiper blade rubber should just miss the aluminum "chrome" windshield trim. So you may have the wrong length on there.

I think there is a way to adjust the flat arm bit into the "U" shaped base a bit to shorten it by a few mm's to miss, but it may damage the paint.

Also, the R & L were originally different lengths IIRC on mine, so that may be the issue.

Otherwise, run them like the Marathon Blue one which just misses the trim, & appears to be no higher than the instrument pod cowl anyway, if it doesn't bother you.

Another trick - since the arms mount on a toothed shaft that the arms can only engage at those points with its female teeth (that term conjures bad dreams blink.gif ) - is to manually play around a bit with the tooth positions on the shaft(s) before mounting the motor/arms/shafts (or by uninstalling them) to get the lowest possible DS position without touching the trim.

This is one of those post resto/repaint things that needs to be fine tuned if you had them out for painting. At least your headlights/eyebrows/hood all look well fitted & adjusted!

Both the Haynes & Factory 8 vol. manuals (or CD thereof) have the wiper arm setting, as well as the shaft adjusting procedure in the factory one.

Good Luck! beerchug.gif
Tom t
End quote.

Here I found the old thread again with pictures:

http://www.914world.com/bbs2/index.php?showtopic=273454

Then you have someone that goes and does this...

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