SpokesT

Well I've sorted it and the car passed its MoT! I pinched the nozzles from my wife's SORNed Nissan Almera, ground them down to fit through the holes in my Lexus bonnet, and swopped em for the colour matched blue ones on there. Full pressure achieved, so it's definitely something inside the jets as described by bullhorn. I can now take my time over unblocking the Lexus ones. Problem now is where to find some replacement plastic push fit studs to hold the bonnet insulation in place... Anyone know what they're actually called so I can google em?

Cheers for that, much appreciated

This might be the answer to my washer issues. Now if I could just get the jets/nozzles off...

I've even thought of simply replacing the nozzles using the ones off my wife's sorned Nissan, as a final test. But after inserting a piece of plastic under the nozzle to release the catch, I can't lift it out any further for fear of doing damage. Why is nothing easy for what appears to be so simple a job??

It's getting more mysterious. The flow from the drivers nozzle is now virtually zero, so I removed all the bonnet insulation to get at the pipe work. That was a pain as the plastic popper things all snapped off so I need to try and find some more from somewhere. I disconnected all the tubing and it all blows through quite okay. I can even blow into the last bit of pipe and out of the nozzle itself. And when I don't connect the pipe to the nozzle and press the washer button, it squirts out the pipe no problem. But as soon as I reconnect it to the nozzle, zero. Any ideas? I'm sure this will be an MoT fail and it's due in three weeks :-(

http://www.eurocarparts.com/universal-12volt-washer-pump

Meantime, I had a sneaky look on the euro car parts website and a universal washer pump is a fiver, presumably the clue is in the title and it will fit an IS200. It looks like it could be a push fit job too, assuming you can access the bottle and it's an external pump not an internal one.

Good calls. I've only had time to try the pin thing so far but it's made no diffs. I'll have a look at the plumbing under the bonnet insulation at the weekend. It's MoT time next month and I presume this will be a fail so I'll need to sort it pronto. Cheers for your time thus far.

Possibly answered elsewhere, apologies if so... My windscreen washer only seems to work on the passenger side. It's weak, but it hits mid screen no problems. On the driver's side it barely clears the wiper's resting position. It's the same pump providing a feed to both jets, so what could the issue be? Surely the vacuum in the plumbing would be balanced, so both sides being the same strength/weakness? I've made sure the jets aren't blocked at the nozzles. Any advice would be appreciated and thanks in advance for your time.

Have you done the job yet? Mine is so weak it barely wets the screen on the driver's side and I have the mot looming.

They've told me that a strip and clean is all that's needed, they do it, it passes the retest, I pay em. Not ideal but not sure what else to do as it's a trustworthy place as far as I'm concerned.

Last time I asked him to show me the imbalance. He showed me while it was on the rolling road. I can't remember the figures now but it was outside the accepted tolerance. Yet there has never been any kind of pulling to one side or the other under braking.

My IS200 recently failed (as usual) it's mot on front brake imbalance. Every year this happens, necessitating a strip and clean of the brakes by the same guy testing the car. I trust him, he's been doing all our vehicles for years, and he tells me he has three other IS200s on his books with the same annual issue. Anyone else have this happen? And if so what can I do to save myself £80 every year? I only do about 6k miles per year in it.

I went back earlier but the car guy had already left. The house guy had a look and spotted that there is a noticeable but slight central channel cut into the original key that has not been put into the new key that doesn't work. I'm hoping that's all that is now needed to be added. I'll let you know if it is so you have some idea as to the answer to your query.

Mines a 52 plate with 72k on the clock. I drove an X5 thinking it would be the bees knees but it was ******* in comparison and it was nice getting back into my own car. Chalk and cheese I know but I didn't expect the big Beemer to feel like I was driving a truck!