Rear wiper motor not working..help..

I have a 98 xj and the rear wiper quit, the washer pump works. I removed the wiper arm and it magically started working. Put the wiper arm back on and it still worked. Lowered the lift gate and it still worked, pushed it further until lift gate latched closed and it quit altogether. Now I can't get it to do anything at all. After messing with the lift gate switch and checking wires/plugs still nothing. It has now thrown a code p1491??? Anyone else encounter this before?
Thanks in advance.

The wiper motor can fail. The wiper motor wire harness can have open circuits, or short circuits. Test the wire harness and wiper motor.

P1491 is probably unrelated.

P1491 - Radiator Fan Relay Circuit Condition

Possible causes

- Faulty Radiator Fan Control Relay
- Radiator Fan Control Relay harness is open or shorted
- Radiator Fan Control Relay circuit poor electrical connection

Thanks Tim. I tried a known to be good wiper motor, still nothing. I'll test out the harness one of these days when I get a chance. There is a switch on the catch that can be faulty, thought I'd try that. Unfortunately I cannot find anyone in the aftermarket that makes them, as Dodge told me they were discontinued.

Probably the harness from the chassis to the hatch. Mine on my 98 was flaking out, replaced it with a junkyard unit and all was fine for two years, flaked out again. I stripped the harness down and found something like 8 of the 13-14 wires in it to be either broken in half or only a few strands from breaking. Rebuilt it entirely using MIL-22759 grade aerospace wire from the scrapbin at work and it never gave me a problem again.

Chrysler did not use very good wire for a high-flexure environment and XJs are getting on in years now. These issues are only going to become more common in the future, unfortunately.

Other problem spots: the harnesses to both front doors (speakers cutting out? Windows won't roll up or lock?) And most of the connectors in the rear quarterpanels for the rear lighting, soundbar, and trailer tow get flaky if you are in the rustbelt and your rear quarters have rust holes in them under the bumper end caps.

Those wires are problematic. Used to have the same problems on the full size jeep tailgate, they would get crimped and torn / frayed over time.