In the 3 years we have had our C-Max I have replaced the rubber part of the blade several times with refills bought from eBay for about £12 (ish). These have allways been very good.

But recently the wipers started to judder and make an annoying noise at the same time. I swapped the refills over, but the judder was still there.

I cam to the conclusion that the whole blade would need replacing as it would appear that some of the tension (springyness) had been lost in the blade over 4 years. I was going to buy some Halfords blades for £37.50 but decided to try Ford. To my surprise I was able to buy some Ford ones for £39.50

These were fitted and they are perfect i.e. no noise and a very clean sweep

Has anyone else found that the blades can only be refilled so many times?

And are the Halfords ones any good?

The new Ford ones have a wear indicator, bet that says they needs replacing quickly

I recently purchased a set for mines, aero wiper blades or whatever they're called from halfords. They are prety good and i always remember halfords branded blades lasted longer than the bocsh ones. Pretty good at clearing the windscreen and no noise. Im no wiper connoisseur but they pretty good, only thing is the price of them. I have seen cheaper alternatives on eBay for as little as 20 excluding P+P, but have never tried them, due to everytime when i change mines they are completely knackered and cant afford to wait as its pretty handy to be able to see out the windscreen!

The aero blades fitted to my 05 car from new lasted 3 years, the longest I have ever run blades for. When I traded the car in, they were leaving just a few light streaks on the screen, but were still fine to use if you were not too fussy.

My first replacement wipers were Bosch Aerotwins, which seem to have become even more pricey since then - I paid £30 at the time, but it seems to have drifted upwards - perhaps the recession will help there.

Then I tried a set from an outfit called wipers.co.uk. They seem to be sold on ebay for <£20. My verdict: DIRE - they didn't have the right springeyness/bendyness (technical terms?) in the blade, so left areas unswept because they didn't bend and stay flush against the screen. Then coming down the M6 toll in rain and a strong cross-wind the long blade started flapping around (i.e. bending back). They had to go.

Now I'm using Valeo X-TRM, which are a bit sleeker than the Bosch, and I got them from ebay for £25 all-in. They don't seem to be quite as good as the Bosch, but obviously are a fair bit cheaper, if they're still available at that price. HTH

Regards

Just catching up on old posts here.

I recently bought Dunlop blades for my 2004 CMax at Costco - £12.50 for the pair. I have been using them for a month and they are very good.

Are the dunlops complete blades and backer or just refills

I'm still running on the ebay ones from Germany but wondering what to buy next.

Bob

Sorry for delay. The Dunlops are full blade and backing not just the refill - the price was actually £13.00 for two. So much cheaper than the internet sites. They seem to work well - as well as the Bosch ones anyway.

Cheers Monkeyboy,

I'll keep an eye out for those.

Bob