We all have our nemeses. Sherlock Holmes had Moriarty, pasta has anti-pasto, Rick Sanchez has Mr.Nimbus, David Tracy has rust and order, and I have the general sense of doing the right thing, but in autumn I have a very specific nemesis: pine needles and leaves at the base of my windshields. Back in February, I was so very cross about a related issue with this, a lone pine needle stuck under a wiper blade, that I came up with some solutions for that specific problem.
Now I realize what a fool I was! A sexy, stupid fool! Because that barely scratches the surface of the problem, which is so much worse, especially for modern cars that tend to have wipers that at least partially disappear under the hood. I know you know the problem, where the area where your wipers reside, languidly, becomes a foul nest of leaves and needles and crap, which then migrates under your hood, clogging your HVAC vents and making a mess of things. Possibly a fire hazard, too. We need a solution. Hear me out here.
First, here’s a few quick pictures of the problem. These are taken of my wife’s Volkswagen Tiguan, which you may recall is a massive pile. But this isn’t really a problem unique to the Tig, I believe most cars on the road would have the same issue, which is this:
I’m sure this is familiar to most of our readers who park their cars out under the starry skies. The design of most car wipers now is that they reside in a little trench at the base of the windshield, and that trench fills up, lavishly, with leaves and pine needles and all that crap.
In the case of the Tiguan up there, this is a car that’s daily driven, and I’d just cleaned that crap out a couple days ago. This isn’t long-term accumulation: it’s just an example of the constant, irritating struggle that makes hood-and-wiper design of cars from the past, oh, 20 years or so completely incompatible with the vast swaths of our planet with trees and seasons.
When I wrote about the similar problem in February, I was mostly just focused on my daily driver, a Nissan Pao:
The Pao’s somewhat archaic design just has the wipers out there, exposed and unashamed. And while leaves certainly do accumulate, it’s by no means nearly as bad as the Wiper Trench setup, which captures and traps the leaves and needles, letting them form dense mats of discarded plant life around the wipers and under the hood.
So what can we do to solve this overlooked yet significant problem? I think the answer is actually relatively easy, and employs one of humankind’s greatest allies: rubber.
Here’s what I’m thinking:
There needs to be some sort of rubber mat, a leaf-and-needle barrier, that completely seals the Wiper Trench, keeping it free from falling debris. The rubber barrier will meet the windshield, but not be sealed to it, and will be flexible enough that the wipers can easily push through the barrier when in use. Maybe windshield washer nozzles will need to be able to poke through the barrier. That seems solvable.
The barrier may need to be perforated to allow for HVAC air intakes to still function; and while that may limit the amount of air going in, I’m pretty damn sure it’ll be better than what those vents can take in when there’s four inches of packed pine needles crammed on them. Or, carmakers can pull air from somewhere else! Designers love their grilles, after all; let ’em put them to use.
My wife said she’d be happy with something she could lay atop the wipers when parked, and then remove when driving, but I don’t think people will want to bother with that, and they’ll just quit doing it after a while. I think this needs to be an integrated part of the upper hood. It could be sold as an aftermarket accessory, but ideally something like this will just be integrated into the design of the hood from the get-go.
Also, the rubber component should be easily removable, and treated as a consumable, since it will invariably dry out or tear or whatever, and that should just be accepted with grace from the start.
I feel like the Wiper Trench leaf/needle accumulation problem is one of those that is so widespread, we’ve all just become blind to it. But why should we? It causes real problems with wiper performance, which can be a safety issue, it clogs intakes and all kinds of underhood components, and, with EVs that have frunks, it can get your luggage all covered in tree crap.
Why should we sit by and accept this? What are we, animals? Time to get some designers and engineers to play with sheets of plastic until this problem is solved.
PERMANENTLY.
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My last house had a giant pine tree near the garage that absolutely SPEWED sap. I did a poor job of dealing with it, and that stuff was freaking everywhere. I learned a few techniques to get them off, and a detail handled the rest – but sap is a freaking nightmare.
Come to think of it, at that same house I had an electrical issue as some rodent chewed a bunch of stuff under the hood. Glad I moved!
There’s a thing called a “Garage” where you park your car inside.
If you don’t have one of those, there’s a thing called a “Carport” which you park your car under.
If you have neither of those – they sell these things called “Car Covers”
All of them keep needles out of your wiper gutter – plus they keep your lights from fogging, your seals from rotting, your clear coat from peeling, your interiors from cooking….
Not all places have garages, or room for carports. Nor is a (if daily driver) daily on/off of a cover good for the cars clearcoat since now your rubbing all that nice grit between the cover and paint. Fun car, more doable.
Id buy torches product.
Curse ye, go park in your chariot palace and leave us rabble alone
Gutter Helmet for cars? I guess I lucked by having no trees in my front yard.
Or, you know, move out of the forest and/or park in a garage [maybe build one?]; there ARE options, Jason!
You never know another person’s situation, options aren’t always options.
As someone who parks under loblolly pines and literally spent 15 minutes this afternoon picking six inch long needles out of both our our car’s wiper trenches I heartily cosign this idea.
The 1968-1972 Corvette had a wiper door that does what you ask. As I recall it had problems, snow figured in it somehow I think the problem was that the door would not close after driving in the snow and then you couldn’t open the hood without breaking something. Or not, it’s been a while. If it worked, they would probably be all over now.
In the meantime “pool noodle”
Enough snow and ice can freeze pretty much anything solid, to thr point of burning out a motor (wipers, access doors, whatever) if you turn it on without breaking it free first.
Plus, as much as not many Corvettes are ever winter-driven, not having wipers because you can’t get them out is a mild safety issue.
Well if the Vette wiper door were electric that would be one thing, but they were vacuum-operated so that in some failure modes they would take out your brakes I suppose, or maybe close under wide open throttle like the headlights on a Lotus Elan.
Right, yeah, I was sure I’d seen wiper doors on some classic car, don’t think it was a corvette, more likely something Italian or British, but that seems easier to construct.
There should be a car based solution to this problem. Step 1: equip all cars with turbos. Step 2: redirect turbo blow off valve outlet into Wiper Trench. Step 3: Drive. Aggressively.
I feel your pain. That stuff finds every seam and opening on your car. I use a leaf blower just about daily to blow all the tree stuff out of the wiper areas and roof of our cars. Once in awhile, open the trunk and clear that stuff out of the seals too.
Your rubber idea will probably work once, as the wipers extend. I have a feeling that the rubber will be less cooperative to let them store again, seeing as it would have to be floppy enough to lay on the windshield when stored, which likely would make it uncooperative for the wipers to slide back in.
If only there were a building you could park your vehicle in…
Dude, You covered it! I’m Appalled I Didn’t Know C3 Corvette Wipers Did This But Delighted That I Know NowBy
Jason Torchinsky Published April 23, 2021
Enough is enough! I have had it with these motherf***ing pine needles on this motherf***ing Tiguan!
Just today I had to pull over to investigate a strange tapping sound. The culprit was a leaf stem sticking out of this trench and constantly tapping against the windshield. This would definitely be a useful car accessory.
Compressor, blow gun, set it at 120psi. Nothing motivates leaves and pine needles to move quite like it.
This revives memories of the bad old days when I had to park near pines. Had to stuff an old bath towel in the Audi’s wiper trench. The needles, the pollen, the sap: conifers got no business being planted in a city.
Heavens forfend we should have an approximation of a natural diversity of tree species! Perhaps cities ought not be built where the conifers are…
(Seriously though it’s not just conifers, there’s a Honey Locust that overhangs my driveway that absolutely buries my car.)
We know you have a chainsaw. Chainsaw, meet pine trees. Problem solved.
Doesn’t work if the trees are on your neighbor’s property.
Chainsaws work on neighbors too. Then they won’t be the neighbor’s trees anymore.
Rust Dave approves.
get a windshield frost protector but slide it down so it covers the wiper trench.
this might be overkill but to this effect:
https://www.walmart.com/ip/Car-Windscreen-Cover-Magnetic-Snow-Frost-Ice-Auto-Windshield-Front-Window-Protector-UV-Sun-Reflector-Guard-Winter-Hood-All-Weather-Cars-SUV-Vehicles-/1513808103
Agreed that would work, but wouldn’t it be nice if the manufacturer solved it so we don’t have too?
The needles would go right through any perforations. Those things will work their way into any gap larger than 10 microns. I marvel every year at their ability to get everywhere.
Just get rid of all the trees. Problem solved. Know anyone with a chainsaw?
Have you thought about chainsawing the leaves away?
I just park in a garage, but the homes I have owned for the past 30 years have typically been devoid of trees. I did grow up in NC, however, and my parents parked their cars outside underneath pine trees. Needles, sap, and pine cones ahoy! Eventually my dad had enough and had all the pines removed (17 if I recall, it’s been 40 years). He left the oaks, red tips, and dogwoods intact.
Battery-powered mini-leaf blower.
done
Putting aside the fact that you already have the solution to your leaves and needles problem, you last used it to extract the batteries from the ChangLi. Also putting aside the fact that garages and carports and car covers exist since these solutions are boring so I can’t blame you for overlooking them.
So, anyways, here’s some suggestions I have just off the top of my head:
Option 4 seems the correct answer here.
Where do I sign up for the trained squirrels?
I was thinking compressed air- surely we can come up with an integrated solution whereby there’s an option on the wiper stalk to trigger a blast of air to ‘evacuate the trench’ prior to wiper activation. As a bonus, if you’re being tailgated you could shoot the moldering detritus over the roof and onto the windshield of the car behind.
I would really like to see Jason design an icon for that feature – ideally something that could be mistaken for a graphic illustration of explosive diarrhea. Of course, this icon should be brightly illuminated and in prime position on the dashboard, though I guess in a pinch it could be buried in a touchscreen menu and accompanied by childish sound effects when pressed.
This is the correct answer.
I agree the compressed air is probably the most practical but I was leaning towards the fire nozzles as the most exciting…or possibly some combination of the fire nozzles and trained squirrels. They could wear those shiny silver fire suits!
Question: have you considered a galvanized steel carport?