Yesterday, my car was encased in ice. I was scraping it off the windows and digging out the windscreen wipers. Odd thing to do in October, but there you go.

It was only later when the spoiler went up on the motorway did I wonder if there are any special things you need to do to defrost this part of the car. By that time it had thawed out, but in a cold day, moisture in the joints will have frozen and locked the moving parts together.

 

Sounds like a good time to just turn it off!

 

WOW!
Never though about that. Perhaps if you park outside in bad weather, you should remove the fuse for the spoiler or something. You would hate to burn out the motor or ??? because of it being frozen shut. I remember that was a big problem with the cars with fold away headlights, in the early days.

 

I've driven mine in two winters.. i haven't had any problems..but who knows, they could be there..

Maybe there's some sort of feature that if the motor feels to much resistance, it won't deploy?

 

I saw a complete assembly for sale on ebay, and was noticing the mechanical advantage and large motor this is built with. It would have to be "potted" in ice to cause a problem, I think. A thin shell would be no problem.

BTW, this car doesn't like it when the spoiler function is defeated.

Asking fireAMX what he did might point you in the right direction...


Or go on permanent holiday to Majorca?

 

Hairy, it never hurts to gently take your hand & whack the seams around the spoiler, just in case. And check to make sure it goes up before you take it out on the road!
In the 2 years we've had the Coupe & throughout the snowiest winter on record here last year we've never had a single issue with the spoiler other than an intermittent squeak that went away after a wee bit of WD-40 sprayed on the moving parts.

 

The spoiler stops from deploying if there's too much resisitance (at least, it's supposed to).

 

Don't worry. I had this happen to me not once, but twice last year. Completely encased in about 1-2 inches of ice (surprising thing is the car drives amazing on solid ice too :-P ).

Just make sure you clean all the ice off of all the windows, completely off the wipers, and when it comes to the spoiler, I just made sure that I chiseled the gap between it and the rest of the rear hatch and whatnot. Worked fine and never had a problem with it going up or having a hard time to.

 

I don't live where we get that much ice, so never had a problem myself, but I think I'd worry too. I'd say if you know an icy night is coming up, just raise the wing manually when you park it for the evening. Then you don't have to worry about the motor since it's already up.

 

When there is that much ice I stay below 62 mph...

seriously, though, I've gone three winters and never had a problem - but then again, I get to keep it in a nice warm garage at night...

 

CHeck with chrysler if they have the heated spoiler package.