Windscreen washer level warning light

A

Andybutters

Member
 Nottingham
Hi, this is my first post,..

About to buy a beautiful 2007 3.0 si z4 with 60000 miles, 1 small issue I spotted was the windscreen washer level warning light on the dash, the guy I’m buying from seems to think it could be a seal, anyone know if this may be a bigger issue,

I know it’s a small thing but any advice would be greatly appreciated.

Cheers

Andy
 
Hi and welcome aboard. :thumbsup:

All the 3.0 litres have headlight washers regardless of whether they have Halogen or Bi-Xenon headlights.

When I collected my current Coupe the low washer fluid light came on when I was driving home and when I got home I noticed one of the headlight washers was sticking up proud of the bumper.

I put 2 litres of fluid in on a dry day and could see a puddle under the car - 2 litres leaked out in 2 days!

Luckily I bought a working headlight washer jet on here and got it fitted.

I say luckily because I think a new one is about £85, and it's a right PITA to fit as you can only get to it via the access panel for the headlights in the wheel-arch liners with the steering on full lock - or with a wheel off!

So I'd definitely recommend negotiating on price, or asking the seller to fix it!
 
thanks for that, i will have a word with him, i have already negotiated a £200 discount as well because of the issue and also the drivers side bolster needs attention to the leather.

so maybe i could sort it myself.

cheers

andy
 
Although [ref]Mr Tidy[/ref]'s suggestion is probably the correct one, I'd look at that as the worst case scenario.
Until you have a chance to park it on a dry surface and fill the washer bottle, you don't know if maybe it is something even simpler.
If you already have £200 off because of that issue then it sounds like financially you'd be ahead whatever.
And if it does turn out to be the headlamp washer then maybe it would be pluggable until you get a chance to fix it anyway?
 
Yeah I think your right pal, the bases are covered financially, so I think I will let it go, and sort it myself,
Thanks for the advice 👍
 
Hi, so I had a look at the windscreen washer level warning light today.

Filled the tank with water and tried the washer on the windscreen, nothing happened and I couldn’t even hear the motors,
Then I noticed water coming from the offside headlight washer, took the panel off inside the wheel arch, and sure enough there was water coming out of washer jet. All the pipework seemed ok.

I don’t quite understand how the system actually works, so any advice please, and is the jet knackered and is it bumper off to get it off and replace it?

Andy
 
It sounds like the washer itself is leaking, which is exactly the issue I had with my passenger one

You can actually remove the jet from the body of the washer by holding a couple of clips out of the way, but it's a 3-handed job! Once you've got it out there is a rubber O-ring that acts as a seal at the bottom of the jet, and if you can find one the right size replacing it might solve your problem.

In theory you can remove them via the headlight access panel in the wheel-arch, but even Ross (Bowser134 on here) needed to also remove the lower part of the wheel-arch liner to get to it - although that is less painful than bumper removal!

Bear in mind that the headlight washers only operate if you have the headlights on, and then only once unless you turn the ignition off and on again.

If it is just the pipework leaking I have the 2 pipes that go to the washers, just not the one from the fluid reservoir.

Good luck getting it sorted. :thumbsup:
 
Am I right in thinking the washer system works on a pressure system, so if I plugged them up as suggested by enuff_zed , ie bypassed them then would the windscreen washer work?
 
Yes, when the pump operates the water pressure makes the washer jets pop up from the bumper and spray the headlights.

There is a T piece that connects the pipe from the pump to the 2 pipes that go to the washer jets so if you could plug the end of the pipe from the pump you wouldn't lose washer fluid from the reservoir so the screen washers would still work.

But if you have Bi-Xenon headlights you are supposed to have headlight washers, although I read somewhere that for cars registered before 2009 they still aren't an MOT fail.
 
That’s sounds like a quick fix for now, at least I should be able to use the screen wash which is more important.

Thanks mate
 
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