Washer fluid resistor

[[email protected]]

I'm removing my washer fluid tank...does anyone know what resistor I need to cancel out the low fluid warning?

Thanks.

[old guy]

You can probably just unplug the sensor and check the Ohms when it is still in the washer fluid and pick up a resistor of the same value.

[[email protected]]

You can probably just unplug the sensor and check the Ohms when it is still in the washer fluid and pick up a resistor of the same value.

There's no fluid in the tank and I cannot put fluid in the tank. Can I still just check ohms?

[old guy]

There's no fluid in the tank and I cannot put fluid in the tank. Can I still just check ohms?

If the sensor is out of the fluid I would expect you will get the resistance required to give you a "'low fluid" indicator light. Can you get to the sensor to put it in water and then check?

[[email protected]]

If the sensor is out of the fluid I would expect you will get the resistance required to give you a "'low fluid" indicator light. Can you get to the sensor to put it in water and then check?

Sure, that's a great idea. Thanks Fletcher!

Just to reiterate, I need to check the ohms on the sensor, not the plug...is that correct?

[FoRbAnNa]

Thats correct. Lol I was gonna test the resistance in the sensor tomorrow actually. But I don't think its really a sensor, more likely just two metal pins with a little distance between then in the tank and if you have enough washer fluid or water in the tank to submerge them then the water/fluid would conduct the current and your DIS won't show a warning about low washerfluid level in the tank. In a DIY boardcomputer retrofit I saw that you have to connect a wire from the cluster to ground if you don't have a washerfluid sensor, if not you would have the low washerfluid warning all the time. So I'm guessing no resistor is needed, just short them would do the trick I think. But I'll check for sure tomorrow.

[[email protected]]

Thats correct. Lol I was gonna test the resistance in the sensor tomorrow actually. But I don't think its really a sensor, more likely just two metal pins with a little distance between then in the tank and if you have enough washer fluid or water in the tank to submerge them then the water/fluid would conduct the current and your DIS won't show a warning about low washerfluid level in the tank. In a DIY boardcomputer retrofit I saw that you have to connect a wire from the cluster to ground if you don't have a washerfluid sensor, if not you would have the low washerfluid warning all the time. So I'm guessing no resistor is needed, just short them would do the trick I think. But I'll check for sure tomorrow.

Great. Make sure to post up the results

[FoRbAnNa]

I got an update for you. First I used my multimeter to check the resistance in the tank with only water in it, then poured the water out and put in pure washerfluid (antifreeze to about -13*C). The resistance with only water was 1.5-1.8MΩ and about the same for washerfluid 1.5-1.9MΩ with my first multimeter so I tried two other multimeters I had laying around but both had low battery so they both stopped working while I was testing. To me it seemed like there was something wrong because I never would have thought that there was so much resistance in water and washerfluid so I pried the sensor out and yes, it is really a german engineerings ingenuity behind this "sensor" as I thought See picture below. The sensor is really just two metal pins with a distance of 1cm between them and works basically by the principle of water or washer fluid closing the circut and when its less than 1litre left in the tank the pins in the "sensor" is no longer submerged in fluid and that would break the circut and you would get a "low washerfluid level" warning in your DIS. If you have a multimeter you could test the resistance in water or washer fluid with the testpins in the fluid with about 1cm distance between the testpins and see if you also get as high resistance as I did.

The lowest resistance I got was when I put the sensor in hot water, then it was more like 1.3-1.4 MΩ. Since the sensor is just two pins I don't think you would need a resistor at all, just short the two wires and your DIS would think your running some hightech ultra pure low resistance washer fluid

[Dan1969]

I need to replace my washer nozzle on the headlight, too lazy though.

[[email protected]]

The lowest resistance I got was when I put the sensor in hot water, then it was more like 1.3-1.4 MΩ. Since the sensor is just two pins I don't think you would need a resistor at all, just short the two wires and your DIS would think your running some hightech ultra pure low resistance washer fluid

You are the man

So how should I short the two wires/pins?

[FoRbAnNa]

Thats up to you. You can either just put a wire from pin 1 to pin 2 in the connector and just use some electrical tape over the connector or take out the "sensor" as I did and just wrap a stripped wire around the two pins and tape over it with electrical tape. Or you could try and find an opposite connector that fits in the plug that used to be connected to the level sensor and just use a replacement wire from the dealer to make a loop. Let me know how it works out