Your windshield wipers are probably the last thing on your mind when driving. However, you might have not survived a stormy weather without your car’s windshield wipers – as it improves your visibility on a rainy and snowy day. This car safety equipment went through evolution through the years.
The idea was first conceptualized by Mary Anderson, who first filed for a patent for her idea to make windshield wipers. She tried to sell this patent to car manufacturers but no one bought it. While this lady inventor didn’t have enough luck on her side to profit from her masterpiece, other people made some significant progress in selling their version of the product, including brothers William and Fred Folberth. They invented the automatic windshield wipers, which work because of an engine pumping air to a motor that makes the device work.
The idea was first conceptualized by Mary Anderson, who first filed for a patent for her idea to make windshield wipers. She tried to sell this patent to car manufacturers but no one bought it. While this lady inventor didn’t have enough luck on her side to profit from her masterpiece, other people made some significant progress in selling their version of the product, including brothers William and Fred Folberth. They invented the automatic windshield wipers, which work because of an engine pumping air to a motor that makes the device work.
Bosch made an electronic version of the invention, but it was only fitted to luxury cars. Further down the road, a man named Robert Kearns patented an irregularly powered version of the equipment and presented it to Ford, a big car manufacturing company. The product was introduced to the company’s future car models, but Mr. Kearns filed a lawsuit against the company for using his ideas without his permission. Mr. Kearns won the legal battle and claimed huge sums of money for the actions made by Ford against his patented design.
While yesteryears’ methods of making windshield wipers were mostly done manually, it is done today at a much faster pace, thanks to the ever-progressing technologies that helped the sector hasten up the work by the use of automated machines. The modern-day version of this equipment is built from two major parts, the first one is the ‘arm’ and the other is the ‘rubber blade’ that wipes the elements off your car’s front window.
Rubber blades are made from rubber trees or synthetic rubber; whichever is more convenient for the manufacturer. They add black carbon powder and start mixing it to form the blades. The arm is processed by inserting a sheet steel in a machine that can precisely cut the metal to make the arm of the equipment. When the arms are completed, they are combined with the rubber blade. The products then go through meticulous phases of fortification and post processing to meet set quality standards. After they pass these tests, they are now ready to be installed to the vehicle of choice.
Depending on the vehicle, there are different kinds of windshield wipers installed. First is the parallel moving variant, where the blades never meet each other. Another type is the simple arc, which consists of only one blade that covers the entire window of the car in an arcing motion. The Pantographic system is a variety that is more often found on buses that wipes the obstruction on the driver’s vision in a horizontal manner.
While yesteryears’ methods of making windshield wipers were mostly done manually, it is done today at a much faster pace, thanks to the ever-progressing technologies that helped the sector hasten up the work by the use of automated machines. The modern-day version of this equipment is built from two major parts, the first one is the ‘arm’ and the other is the ‘rubber blade’ that wipes the elements off your car’s front window.
Rubber blades are made from rubber trees or synthetic rubber; whichever is more convenient for the manufacturer. They add black carbon powder and start mixing it to form the blades. The arm is processed by inserting a sheet steel in a machine that can precisely cut the metal to make the arm of the equipment. When the arms are completed, they are combined with the rubber blade. The products then go through meticulous phases of fortification and post processing to meet set quality standards. After they pass these tests, they are now ready to be installed to the vehicle of choice.
Depending on the vehicle, there are different kinds of windshield wipers installed. First is the parallel moving variant, where the blades never meet each other. Another type is the simple arc, which consists of only one blade that covers the entire window of the car in an arcing motion. The Pantographic system is a variety that is more often found on buses that wipes the obstruction on the driver’s vision in a horizontal manner.