There’s nothing worse than squeaky Wiper Blades. How often have you found yourself just hitting the single wipe switch, and that only when your visibility gets really bad? That’s extremely stressful and highly risky, but thankfully, you can take some simple actions to prevent the problem.

First of all, keep your whole windscreen clean. When you wash your car; don’t forget to lift the wiperblades off the windscreen and wash and rinse the area underneath them, even though this isn’t the area you see through.
It’s important to keep the whole windscreen clean, because, when the windscreen is wet, the dirt particles become very mobile, and can get beneath the edge of the blade. This has several effects:-

Firstly, the particles between the screen and the blade cause uneven contact|friction between screen and blade. This causes the blade to vibrate, generating noise. This problem is exacerbated if you have rubber Windscreen Wipers, because they loose their flexibility with age and exposure to Ultra Violet Light, Ozone, many Screen Wash ingredients, and pollution. As the blade becomes stiffer it’s far more likely to jump and judder as it moves from clean to dirty glass.

Secondly, the dirt & grit particles abrade and cut the surface of the wiper blade right at the critical working edge. On rubber Wiper Blades this also increases the area for UV, Pollution, Ozone and solvents to attack the rubber, so accelerating the stiffening process, which in turn makes the noise worse.

Thirdly, the dirt and grit particles settle on the non-working surfaces of the wiper blade. These particles harbour road grease & pollutants, which attack the rubber from the sides, causing faster hardening and in turn more susceptibility to juddering and noise.
When the blade looses its flexibility and then is subjected to juddering, it tears at the mounting. As a result the rubber wears or tears at the critical mounting points, and the mounting points themselves become deformed and loose. This in turn leads to more judder, and so the cycle speeds accelerates.

Flat Blade Wipers are much more resistant to this last problem, because they have a much broader fixing point between the blade and the Parts which hold it in place.

As usual, prevention is much better, easier and cheaper than a cure. A stitch in time really can save 9.

Careful cleaning of your Wiper Blades will greatly reduce the tendency to judder and make noise, and if you’re not lucky enough to have Silicone Windscreen Wiper Blades, it will also markedly slow down the predictable aging process of the rubber.

So, to sum up
To lessen and avoid the problem on existing Wiper Blades, keep them clean, and be prepared to replace them as soon as the rubber shows signs of stiffening, porosity, cracking or ripping.

When you replace your Wiper Blades consider using Retrofit Flat Blade Wipers, because they hold the blade much more securely, so reducing the opportunity for vibration in the first place, and ripping in the second.

Better still, look for Silicone Windscreen Wiper Blades. The silicone resin stays constantly flexible throughout life, and gives smooth quiet operation for at least 3 times the life of even the best rubber Wiper Blades.

Best of all look for Silicone Flat Blade Wipers. They combine all the advantages of Silicone Windscreen Wiper Blades with the looks & performance of Flat Wiper Blades.