Tools to Repair Windshield Washer System

Series Summary

Seeing is believing, especially when you are driving on a mountain road with tight corners and bending curves. You want to see the road as clearly as possible to know just how and when to turn or you could end up at the bottom of a ravine. Imagine that some dust from the mountain or a squadron of dragonflies settles on your windshield; you will not be able to see unless your washer system is working properly. If it is, you just press a button or pull a lever and a powerful cleaning solution spays onto your window and cuts through all the grime. If not, you will have to stop and find and old rag in your trunk to clean off the windshield, wasting valuable travel time. Or you could just keep driving, trying to peer around the splats and skids on your windshield, but you really wouldn’t try to do that, would you?

In this free series of auto maintenance videos from our car repair expert, you will learn how to troubleshoot and then repair the windshield washing system in your car. Our expert Nathan McCullough begins with the right tools for the job and a brief discussion of the what type of fluid you should have in your windshield washer fluid reservoir. Then he gets down to the basics of finding your reservoir and the other components of your windshield washing system. You will learn how to run an electrical check on this system, and then how to take apart the whole system should you discover that it is not in good working order. Nathan will show you how install a new pump and then test the rest of the system.

Video Transcript

"Hi, my name is Nate McCullough on behalf of Expert Village. In these clips we are going to talk about some of the possible problems with your windshield washer system and some hints and tips to get better performance out of it. In this clip, we are going to talk about the tools required in order to service your washer solvent system. What I have in front of me is my standard metric Kraftsman socket set with a couple of extra spaces. I have my test light, have some winter washer solvent and you can see it is still liquid and for demonstration purposes, I have my summer washer solvent and as you can see, it is a block of ice, not even slushy. These are the tools and supplies that are required to surface your washer solvent system. "