[Fronzdan]

Hmm...I didn't think so, but damn, you're right.

[HighlandPete]

Originally Posted by Jet Driver

Also, I think, if you push down and hold it, it will wipe for as long as you hold it down.

Yes it does, the whole system is much more logical and user friendly than we may first think.

HighlandPete

[retiredmarine]

At night the automatic function really lacks. I think it's because it uses a camera and at night it isn't as efficient.

[ft1330]

Originally Posted by HighlandPete

That is not correct, pull to clean the screen and you get about four passes of the wipers.

If you just pull for a quick squirt you may not get any wiper action, I like that when needed, but a longer pull will definitely clean the screen, auto sensing on or not. Then return to auto if switched on.

I'm in the Highlands of Scotland, Lochaber region, so get high rainfall of all kinds, more than most will ever get. I know the wiper system pretty well, as you can imagine.

HighlandPete

I don't think you get as much rain as we do here in the Philadelphia area. In fact, we get more rain than probably the amazon rain forest

[HighlandPete]

Originally Posted by ft1330

I don't think you get as much rain as we do here in the Philadelphia area. In fact, we get more rain than probably the amazon rain forest

I read that "Philadelphia has had an average rainfall of 41.53 inches over the last 30 years".

My local MET Office weather station (6 miles from home) has recorded an annual average rainfall of over 71" for the past 30 years. Last year was over 82" of rain.

Guess that means my wipers get a decent work out.

HighlandPete

[ft1330]

Originally Posted by HighlandPete

I read that "Philadelphia has had an average rainfall of 41.53 inches over the last 30 years".

My local MET Office weather station (6 miles from home) has recorded an annual average rainfall of over 71" for the past 30 years. Last year was over 82" of rain.

Guess that means my wipers get a decent work out.

HighlandPete

I was kidding of course. But Philadelphia gets a lot of rain for sure. But let me ask you, how do you get 71'' over the past 30 years when last year you had 82''?

[HighlandPete]

Originally Posted by ft1330

I was kidding of course. But Philadelphia gets a lot of rain for sure. But let me ask you, how do you get 71'' over the past 30 years when last year you had 82''?

71" is the average annual rainfall, we do exceed the 82" some years.

Originally Posted by HighlandPete

My local MET Office weather station (6 miles from home) has recorded an annual average rainfall of over 71" for the past 30 years. Last year was over 82" of rain.

HighlandPete

[ft1330]

Originally Posted by HighlandPete

71" is the average annual rainfall, we do exceed the 82" some years.



HighlandPete

Yeah yeah I know my cognitive functions are impaired this morning

[maverick83]

Tend to agree that at night they don't wipe as often, however at night with little or no street lights, you can get away with less wipes I guess.

I would like for auto to always be auto, eg if auto is selected it should stay on Even with ignition on off.

I had a Jetta 5, that would stay on, and also liked the wipe action better in the Jetta. It was more "graceful" in slow operation, and would have a pause of approx 10 seconds after you washed the windscreen and give a single wipe just to make sure all the wash fluid is gone. Pretty cool.

Also if you look at other German brands they tend to do the same as the VW.

My preffered setting is auto and sensitivity one up, just one higher than lowest. This works a charm for me.

[Blubaron79]

Some of you on here act like it is uncool if you have your wipers going. Who cares? Use them so you can see. I'm not looking at other drivers to see how fast their wipers are going..

[Sladester100]

Kudos blubaron. I was thinking similar when I replied earlier in the thread. If it's raining. I use wipers lol

[Blubaron79]

Originally Posted by Sladester100

Kudos blubaron. I was thinking similar when I replied earlier in the thread. If it's raining. I use wipers lol

[aksi]

Originally Posted by Blubaron79

Some of you on here act like it is uncool if you have your wipers going. Who cares? Use them so you can see. I'm not looking at other drivers to see how fast their wipers are going..

It's not uncool. It is just each person's preference.
For me, I see no problem most of the time with intermittent (faster or slower) and constant wiper motion is actually more distracting for me unless it is needed (yes of course I use that function when I need it).
Whatever works for ya, works for ya, you know?
I haven't been on this forum for awhile and what happened here lol
I was just making example out of other people around me to say I do use less wipers and I was trying to see if there was a way to have intermittent feature on our cars.
You got my intention totally wrong there buddy. I am not a 10 year old.

[msej449]

The 3-Series intermittent wipers are, frankly, not fit for purpose. In fact, they're plain dangerous. My Audi's adaptive wipers worked 99% of the time and my little Peugeot's fixed-interval wipers work fine for probably 90% of the time. The F31's wipers are the most disappointing feature of the car: they are right barely 10% of the time, whatever the setting. I'd happily settle for them being fixed interval, which would be an improvement.

This is odd, as some other features, like adaptive headlights, are very impressive and use some really complex technology that works really well.

I contacted the dealer and it was obvious that queries about the F3x intermittent wipe are common and they immediately said the sensitivity couldn't be adjusted, or set to a fixed interval - without me asking.

I think that BMW simply got this wrong and are afraid to admit it's an issue and make a general recall.

I've just completed an 800-mile drive over two days from the Swiss Alps back to the UK, in snow, sleet and rain and this problem with the wipers is going to be enough for me to swap to another brand next time. Overtaking huge trucks on the Autoroute in France the screen pretty much had to be down at zero visibilty before the wipers engaged. It not a trivial issue for ma and as I said, I think it's a shame, given how great most of the other BMW capabilities and technologies are. The xDrive worked brialliantly in the mountain snow, and the adaptive headlights worked great on our cross-country drive in the dark etc.

I would have thought hat there's enough firmware control in the wiper system for BMW to issue new software to solve this problem.

[HighlandPete]

Originally Posted by msej449

The 3-Series intermittent wipers are, frankly, not fit for purpose. In fact, they're plain dangerous. My Audi's adaptive wipers worked 99% of the time and my little Peugeot's fixed-interval wipers work fine for probably 90% of the time. The F31's wipers are the most disappointing feature of the car: they are right barely 10% of the time, whatever the setting. I'd happily settle for them being fixed interval, which would be an improvement.


....I think that BMW simply got this wrong and are afraid to admit it's an issue and make a general recall.

....I would have thought hat there's enough firmware control in the wiper system for BMW to issue new software to solve this problem.

Are you sure your wipers are working correctly, (sensor is functioning correctly)? Talk of "fit for purpose", "plain dangerous", "general recall", "new software", I sense a total frustration.

It is not as if BMW are new in this auto-sensing wiper game. I've been driving BMWs with them since 2002 and no issues whatsoever, except greasy screens, which we control with cleaning. Just ensure you don't have some sort of coating/grease on the screen which may be the issue.

I could repeat your frustration with a VW Passat, awful function, I too was asking if they could be turned into a manual function. Dealer couldn't fault their function when tested to VW procedure. I tried another Passat, nothing like mine at all. The VW dealer fitted a new sensor and absolutely brilliant after that. From negative frustration, turned to one of the best features on the Passat.

I'd suggest you get into another example on a wet day, see if it is simply a sensor issue.

HighlandPete

[F32Fleet]

I must admit that the wipers aren't that great. The sensor seems to fight with the rest of the system. It almost always goes from intermittent to fast in even the lightest rain. I find myself having to manually set it to slow.

[tboooe]

Originally Posted by aksi

It's not uncool. It is just each person's preference.
For me, I see no problem most of the time with intermittent (faster or slower) and constant wiper motion is actually more distracting for me unless it is needed (yes of course I use that function when I need it).

I actually agree with @aksi. I tend to prefer a slower wiper interval. Living in Socal it doesnt rain a lot so I always turn down intermittent interval on all my cars. I find that even at the slowest settings on all my cars, the wipers are too frequent which I find distracting. Not sure why such as basic feature was not included. I guess its like the temp sync "feature" that BMW didnt give us either.

[Blubaron79]

Originally Posted by aksi

It's not uncool. It is just each person's preference.
For me, I see no problem most of the time with intermittent (faster or slower) and constant wiper motion is actually more distracting for me unless it is needed (yes of course I use that function when I need it).
Whatever works for ya, works for ya, you know?
I haven't been on this forum for awhile and what happened here lol
I was just making example out of other people around me to say I do use less wipers and I was trying to see if there was a way to have intermittent feature on our cars.
You got my intention totally wrong there buddy. I am not a 10 year old.

[Thumper333]

Originally Posted by Blubaron79

Some of you on here act like it is uncool if you have your wipers going. Who cares? Use them so you can see. I'm not looking at other drivers to see how fast their wipers are going..

Right?

I only notice other drivers when literally it's a light drizzle, and some soccer mom in a Yukon has her wipers set to the "plaid" speed setting and I think they may actually fly off the car. LOL Then I notice and chuckle.

The AUTO works just fine for me, and if I have to do a manual wipe every now and again.....it's not the end of the world.

[Fronzdan]

There's nothing uncool about using the wipers. But there are legitimate times when using the normal speed/continuous wipe setting is too much - when the roads are wet and there is spray, light mist etc. If you put the wipers on continuous, the frequency is too fast and you get the wipers groaning across a dry windshield. This is the reason intermittent and/or Auto was created in the first place. So your only option is to switch to Auto. But the sensitivity isn't high enough to pick up that spray or mist, so you need to intervene and force a manual wipe every once in a while. Not the end of the world, but that's a pain. It takes getting used to if you've come from a car with more sensitive Auto or with an intermittent timed mode.

The best solution would be if they had intermittent AND Auto. My Land Rover has that and it works very well for ALL situations.

Other than the Auto sensitivity, I can't say I have any other complaints. I've learned a couple things from this thread already, lol. Can't believe I was never pulling long enough for a spray AND wipe.

[aksi]

Originally Posted by Blubaron79

Alright. I see how you are.
Wasted my time writing.

[aksi]

Originally Posted by Fronzdan

There's nothing uncool about using the wipers. But there are legitimate times when using the normal speed/continuous wipe setting is too much - when the roads are wet and there is spray, light mist etc. If you put the wipers on continuous, the frequency is too fast and you get the wipers groaning across a dry windshield. This is the reason intermittent and/or Auto was created in the first place. So your only option is to switch to Auto. But the sensitivity isn't high enough to pick up that spray or mist, so you need to intervene and force a manual wipe every once in a while. Not the end of the world, but that's a pain. It takes getting used to if you've come from a car with more sensitive Auto or with an intermittent timed mode.

The best solution would be if they had intermittent AND Auto. My Land Rover has that and it works very well for ALL situations.

Other than the Auto sensitivity, I can't say I have any other complaints. I've learned a couple things from this thread already, lol. Can't believe I was never pulling long enough for a spray AND wipe.

Thank u. Yeah, next time I will try auto and see how that goes.