Pleased to have found this thread, I have an E39 and thought the screen wash bottle was awkward to get to but this one is a real piece of work! I guess designers of newer cars try and use all the nooks & crannies but without the DIY link it would have been much tougher. Our fault was simply a failed rear screen pump and the screen wash was clear so no blockages or other reason for it to have failed. New one cost £10 at one of ECP's rare sales [emoji4]
its an hour job, the hardest bit is putting it back in - agree, remove the side indicator. Its a shame you cant buy something that will dissolve the gel like gunk that covers the filters...you can also use a foot pump on the hoses that go to the jets, will force the gunk away from the pump filters, but that only lasts for so long, eventually it comes back...terrible design, never had to do this on any other car or BMW
Syphon the old water out while refilling the tank at the same time with very hot water and blowing down the washer hose. This should dislodge and remove the gunk. Did this a few years ago and been working fine since.
OK, just spent a couple of hours I will never get back making my washers work properly.
Unfortunately no amount of blowing, sucking or hoseing made any difference.
As others have stated you need to
1) Remove Front Offside wheel
2) Remove both front and rear wheel arch linings
3) Unbolt the washer bottle disconnect filler tube, electrical and water connections to pumps and low level warning sensor. Then extract bottle from its location at the rear of the wheel arch.
4) Remove both pumps and the rubber mounting seals. Make sure you find the filters which should be below the seal
5) Thoroughly clean bottle and the filters.
6) reassemble in reverse order.
It sounds easy when written like that but you will encounter lots of dirt which will turn to mud when you remove the filler tube before ensuring the tank is empty!
Getting the bottle back into where it came from is a pain but you should succeed eventually.
I have a picture of the pump and filter but cant work out how to post it. Message me and i will send you a copy.
Syphon the old water out while refilling the tank at the same time with very hot water and blowing down the washer hose. This should dislodge and remove the gunk. Did this a few years ago and been working fine since.
^ this worked for me. Mine had got clogged to the point nothing came out. It was an easy fix and no bottle removal needed. Works perfectly now.
lift the bonnet and disconnect the pipe to the offside front washer.
blow down that pipe to stir up the sediment and gunge. fill up the washer bottle with water ad keep blowing to circulate the deposits.
Push a length of hose pipe down the washer filler. I used syphon hose that I use(d) for brewing beer in the past. Keep pusing it and flexible hose will go right down to the bottom.
suck the end of the pipe to create a vacuum and begin syphoning out the content of the bottle. I kept going to a tap and filling up a 2 litre water bottle to keep a good continuous flow going. eg loads of flushing and diluation. I could see lumps, black bits etc all of which went direct down the drain.
Eventually let is all drain out.
Refilled it with water and you could add some Milton or something to steralise and kill bacteria. I used campden tablets (sodium metabisulphate) or even a bit of household bleach. some people use steradent, all of which are along the same lines.
Let it sit and work as directed.
Again syphon out and keep it running. If you use clear tubing or let it syhpon into a bucket you will eventually see if is running clear. Keep adding the odd blow down the washer pipe to circulate residual sediment.
It will eventually run clear.
Refill with a new washer mix. Job done.
I did this and worked a treat. All I did differently was first drained all my existing washer fluid into a clean vessel, and strained it through a double folded household jaycloth. this removed all the sediment. I then poured this back in after the above cleaning and it works faultlessly.
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