Low washer fluid

[MHambrice]

My check light is coming on and the MID shows washer fluid low. Tank is full. Light and MID go out after a couple of minutes then come back on when I cut it off. Disconnect batteries?

[Dickie B]

Nope. Check to see that the switch hasn't rotated into the wrong position. The connection must come in from the top, i think, so that the float works properly.
You can pull the float switch directly out of the tank (hold you finger over the hole when you do) and check the orientation of the float. It needs to go down and when up, it should be horizontal against the stop arm.
Insert it back into the tank in this orientation.
You would think BMW would have put a tab or something on it to prevent this, but oh well.
anyway, this was the fix I used.
Hope it helps.

[53helofe]

Hey Mike, I had this happen to me a few weeks ago, it was was DickieB says, the sensor had turned. You can just turn it from the outside, rotate it 90 or 180 until you get it in the right position, pretty easy to solve.

[MHambrice]

Thanks Dickie B. and you are right Jason one of the easiest fixes ever. Didn't even take it out, looked in the hole, turned the outside portion until the float was down and presto. These things can be complicated about somethings and so simple about others that I sometimes complicate the simple.
Thanks again for the help.

[mattsimis]

Now that thats solved, a related question!

Im wondering if my engine bay washer tank is filling correctly.. does everyone elses fill to just above the float sensor switch? Ie, 80% of the tank is never filled. It seems thats working as intended, but I dont like this.

[revtor]

mattsimis: That's normal behavior on cars equipped with the SRA headlight washer system. The SRA system only pumps washer fluid from the trunk reservoir to the front when the washer fluid in the front reservoir drops below the level sensor. There's only a low-level sensor in the front reservoir so the SRA system doesn't know when to stop filling the reservoir. Therefore the pump runs only for a short moment and the front reservoir only fills a bit. Because the front reservoir level sensor is mounted low in the reservoir that means the reservoir is always closer to empty than full. More than half of the reservoir is unused. With a 9 liter reservoir in the trunk that's perhaps not much of an issue, but AHK halves the trunk reservoir to 4.5 liters. Therefore cars equipped with AHK and SRA headlight washers have a removable cap on the front washer fluid reservoir. This allows to add a few extra liters to the system to compensate for the smaller trunk reservoir.

In other words (and getting back to a discussion we had years ago); you and I have the wrong front washer fluid reservoir. Anyway, I already replaced the wrong and leaking reservoir with the same wrong reservoir - I'm not going to replace it again. I like my virgin white reservoir and since the cap for the correct reservoir is no longer available the only option is getting a used & ugly yellow cap from eBay. No way...

By the way, you can actuate the trunk washer fluid pump through a diagnostic computer with BMW DIS so filling the front reservoir to the brim is not that difficult (assuming you have BMW DIS of course).

[mattsimis]

Revtor, thanks and I do remember our conversation, its is nice to have a car for years and fellow owners to discuss these very important issues with for the duration!

Weirdly, just last week I was thinking about it and put in an order for the "AHK" washer tank. Im convinced the low filling water level eventually allows the metal studs in the heat shield to fatigue the plastic (and I think having a low fluid level allows a higher proportion of "crud percentage" to gather in it).. if the tank were full it would dissipate heat better. What Im planning, now that Ill have two tanks (ie one to fall back on if I mess things up), is to seal up the low mounted hole for the level sensor and make a new one, 3/4 the way up. That way it will always keep it nicely topped up.

[bsifford]

Revtor, thanks and I do remember our conversation, its is nice to have a car for years and fellow owners to discuss these very important issues with for the duration!

So true. I just got my 850 back after having new intake gaskets installed and it the big M70 is running like gangbusters, but it bugged me with the Low Washer Fluid. I checked the fluid was full, so WTH. Got on the forum and within ~5mins had my answer...AWESOME!!!

[Tomcat BMW]

You guys are geniuses!!! Quick easy fix...rotate switch 90 degrees, no warning lights!!!

[PabloRock]

Ancient thread, but it's funny, I had this issue a year ago and never really bothered to look into it (was going to remove the tank to check the charcoal canister and figured I would worry about it then). But had the hood open at a local C&C and hanging with a friend (fellow BMW enthus). He just looked and said "hey, your float is rotated", turned it and magically the light was gone! (he didn't know I had the warning).

[kiwiCSi]

...Therefore cars equipped with AHK and SRA headlight washers have a removable cap on the front washer fluid reservoir. This allows to add a few extra liters to the system to compensate for the smaller trunk reservoir.

In other words (and getting back to a discussion we had years ago); you and I have the wrong front washer fluid reservoir...

Hi Revtor, I was just reading through your post (from several years ago) and I'm not sure the above statement is entirely correct.
I say this because the front washer tank on my Euro CSi (AHK-equipped) is the factory original part, and has no removable cap.