Here in Salt Lake we get huge amounts of snow. I go to the ski resorts 3 times a week. A few times I have noticed a problem with slushy, thick snow building up at the bottom of the wiper area. There is a V type trap at the bottom of the windshield where thick snow can build up and make the wipers stop and change direction well before the window is clean. I adjusted my wipers up a bit so the snow doesn't get compacted in this trap. I thought of a plan to silicone a piece of PVC (1/2"-3/4") to run across this valley to stop the problem, or some other plastic piece molded to block off this area. Anyone else notice this issue? Any thoughts?

 

I would look into either of these two ideas borrowed from military vehicle technology:

a. Install a 4" tall, stick-on window heater grid along the very bottom of the windshield on the inside. You'll probably have to buy a full-size rear window aftermarket kit and cut it down. Install a series resistor in line with the circuit to keep the shortened grid's current under control. An electrically heated front windshield was a factory option on H1!

b. Lengthen the return hose from the heater core and loop it under the cowl area just below where the wipers park. MB also did something similar with their late 1980's S-Class.

 

Did a search on this a while back (did not find much). It is a issue with the flat windshield design on the H3. My H2 does it also but not to the degree the H3 does. My wife deals with this every other weekend she runs over the pass when snowing. I have thought of drilling some 3/4 holes in the bottom of the tray (have not done it yet) to see if that would take some the build up away, it gets down right nasty, and calls out her having to pull over and clean it out a few times during the trip. Like the heat grid idea, but do not know if it will work in the heavy snow situations? Would thing it would be a big issue with the east coast trucks and wet snow? Pete

 

Thanks NJTEX! I am leaning towards the small defroster strip on the interior that I can manually turn on/off as conditions require. Like I said, it is pretty rare when those soft, slushy snow conditions exist that the problem happens. Also, with your solution, the outside of my truck remains the same.

 

It's something I've always considered doing but in NJ we've only had 2 bad snow years since we purchased our H3 back in late 2005.

Here's a potential aftermarket rear window heater kit: Frost Fighter CLEAR VIEW AUTOMOTIVE DEFROSTER KITS WITH AUTO TIMER - JCWhitney

The 9-grid kit seems like a good candidate and shouldn't look too bad in the interior. The trick would be to use only 6 grid lines respaced on 1/2" centers from the very bottom edge of the windshield so that the installed height of the entire grid is about 3". That should keep it out of the driver's sightline and be high enough to reach the point where the truck's hot air defroster becomes effective.

 

Do you have you defrost on high right from the start? I do get some build up on the highway but if I keep it cranked before it starts to build up it seems to keep it clear. If I wait, it will not catch up once it starts. I doubt what I experience is extreme as it gets on the passes.

 

I'm about 45 miles north of you. I just clean off the windshield and keep the defrost on. The biggest snow issue I have run into is a big pile of snow sliding off the roof onto the windshield when coming to a stop. I usually clean the roof to avoid this, but one time I didn't and boom, windshield blocked.

 

Ya Widespread my truck was fully warm from the start. I had the issue leaving a ski resort at 8,000 ft elevation. It was a blizzard with soft slushy snow. My windows were clean once I left but after 2 miles it just packed up in that channel and got thicker by the minute. Wipers had to be on high from the start. The defrost just doesn't hit the bottom inch of the windshield. I like NJTEKs idea of going with a defrost system in that area.