Wiper speed issue

[Mh59]

My latest update from Lotus on this is that they currently do not have a solution for the issue.

The interim fix, as Lotus refer to it, is to stop the car, turn it off, open the door, close it again, lock and unlock the car, move the wiper to the desire position and restart the car. This is not a one off because it will revert to the failed mode, in my experience on Any interaction with the wiper stalk.

I am not sure if my failed mode is slower than others, but I find even moderate rain won’t clear at 40 or above. When driving through bands of rain I found myself trying to find a safe place to stop every couple of miles in order to reset the car.

Amazing that I’ve just felt taking a screenshot of this was the right thing to do ahead of a 320 mile round trip on Tuesday evening, in case things go wrong. This is not a home built kit car.

While I’ve driven in rain, I don’t recall having to adjust the wiper speed as it’s not rained heavily. Now that I think of it though, I now recall thinking something wasn’t right with the wipers and operating them manually was the quick fix.

I’ll investigate when it’s next raining.

My car was in the dealer for over 2 weeks recently but wipers were not mentioned. Or any software related to that (only the ongoing engine management (emissions) light).

 

[hml_xy]

There have been 3 confirmed cases amongst forum members so far.

You can add me to the list in case you haven't already counted me in (not sure I mentioned it somewhere before).

For the others who got their Emira already:

Steps to reproduce are simple - operate wipers in interval/auto mode and then manually switch out of auto into the higher speed setting.

Result: Wiper stays at same speed and doesn't move faster.
Expectation: Wiper would move faster than before.

 

[ott]

I reported this problem back in Oct last year. Happened immideatly after driving out from showroom, there was heavy rain that day. Was potentially dangerous situation indeed.

 

[digilotus]

I reported this problem back in Oct last year. Happened immideatly after driving out from showroom, there was heavy rain that day. Was potentially dangerous situation indeed.

Still no fix after three months, that's not good for what is a safety issue. I sense that there may be a recall for this problem once a fix is finally available.

 

[Mh59]

You can add me to the list in case you haven't already counted me in (not sure I mentioned it somewhere before).

For the others who got their Emira already:

Steps to reproduce are simple - operate wipers in interval/auto mode and then manually switch out of auto into the higher speed setting.

Result: Wiper stays at same speed and doesn't move faster.
Expectation: Wiper would move faster than before.

I have just tried this for myself. I realised I had the wipers "off" not in auto mode, so by coincidence I guess I haven't driven in much rain or they were probably reset to that while in the dealership for 15 days waiting for brake parts.

I got the same outcome. While in Auto, they worked as expected. I poured some water on the windscreen and observed the speed increased to full before working its way back through normal speed then finally down to idle.

However when I then tried going to full speed from auto, it would not go any faster than normal speed.

The solution was to stop the engine. I then put the ignition on, tested again and it worked normally again.

This is clearly not viable when travelling though if a downpour occurs and certainly not at motorway speeds. I will mention it to my dealer to ensure awareness and see what the plan for fixing is.

 

[Pugwash]

Thanks MH59,
from what you say fastest speed can be achieved either by putting it in Auto and leaving it there or by only operating the wipers manually, normal and then into fast mode.
Its only if you put it into auto mode first and then take it out and manually try and select fast that the issue occurs.
If that is the case, while this is clearly an issue, it is possible to have the wipers in fast mode when you need them.
Have I got that right?

 

[Tonygcar]

Before I retired I was a fault finding electrician in industry and I don’t understand why it’s so difficult and time consuming to find and rectify the fault with the wiper system there are not many things that can go wrong switch, auto sensor, relay/software, motor and wiring. assuming the mechanical parts are all good it shouldn’t take this long to find the fault. The solution so far is to turn the car off, this probably causes the relay/software to open or change state and resets the process, also the switch should override the auto sensor.
come on lotus engineers one sit in the car and operate the wipers and another pour water over the auto sensor and see what condition makes the wipers fail it’s not rocket science

 

[Pugwash]

Having looked at the manual (p124), the implementation is slightly confusing. The stalk is labeled 0 AUT 1 2 (the last two with arrows). It looks like AUT puts it into intermittent (INT) mode, sweep frequency controlled by the ring around the end of the stalk. It only becomes Automatic (rain sensing) if you push the button on the end of the stalk in which case a light comes on the dashboard to tell you it’s in that mode, and the ring now controls sensitivity of the rain sensor. While some owners clearly have a problem here, there is scope for confusion in use. I guess it’s like this anticipating a model that doesn’t have rain sensing wipers.

 

[Mh59]

Thanks MH59,
from what you say fastest speed can be achieved either by putting it in Auto and leaving it there or by only operating the wipers manually, normal and then into fast mode.
Its only if you put it into auto mode first and then take it out and manually try and select fast that the issue occurs.
If that is the case, while this is clearly an issue, it is possible to have the wipers in fast mode when you need them.
Have I got that right?

Yes, I think that is right!
So to clarify;

1. Leave it in manual mode and I then have the full range to use.
2. If it is in Auto mode, I will not get the fastest speed.

Obviously this is just my experience so it might not be the case for all others but at least there is a temporary solution (dont use Auto mode).

 

[duff]

Thanks MH59,
from what you say fastest speed can be achieved either by putting it in Auto and leaving it there or by only operating the wipers manually, normal and then into fast mode.
Its only if you put it into auto mode first and then take it out and manually try and select fast that the issue occurs.
If that is the case, while this is clearly an issue, it is possible to have the wipers in fast mode when you need them.
Have I got that right?

Having had to do the reset 4 times in 10 miles alone in one particular journey I am about as certain as I can be that I only used the off and either normal or fast wipe positions. As the rain was patchy I was trying my absolute hardest to avoid auto/intermittent and even manual mode in the hope that as the next band of rain hit I would not need to stop again, but no avail.
Each time I got stuck in the slow mode the only way I could get things working again was to use the reset procedure I stated in my previous post, including opening the door, anything less didn’t cut it.

 

[Eagle7]

This sounds like a software issue. There must be a buffer or cache that the instructions for running the wiper motors is loaded into, then the control unit pages from that cache to run the wiper system. It's SUPPOSED to empty and clear, when you manually over-ride with the switch to go to the higher speed, but it isn't. This is why it's ignoring your request because it looks into the cache first, and the old instructions are still there, so it uses those instead of doing what you requested. Going through the procedure outlined by @duff above, is telling the car that the driving session is over (opening the door), and that tells it to clear the temporary memory caches. Now everything works correctly because the instructions are loaded fresh from the non-temporary memory where they're stored to begin with.

Tell the dealer and/or Lotus to check the code controlling the memory caches. It sounds like there's an "if, then, else" line either missing, or a character is missing (something simple like a comma, character bracket, etc.) that needs to be fixed.

 

[Concept24]

I am baffled why this seemingly novice line or lines of code would be missing. Hopefully, the simplicity applies to the fix.

 

[Concept24]

Having looked at the manual (p124), the implementation is slightly confusing. The stalk is labeled 0 AUT 1 2 (the last two with arrows). It looks like AUT puts it into intermittent (INT) mode, sweep frequency controlled by the ring around the end of the stalk. It only becomes Automatic (rain sensing) if you push the button on the end of the stalk in which case a light comes on the dashboard to tell you it’s in that mode, and the ring now controls sensitivity of the rain sensor. While some owners clearly have a problem here, there is scope for confusion in use. I guess it’s like this anticipating a model that doesn’t have rain sensing wipers.

If I see any potentially confusing icons or words, the first thing I'd do is look at the owner's manual. Is that clearer?

 

[Pugwash]

If I see any potentially confusing icons or words, the first thing I'd do is look at the owner's manual. Is that clearer?

Well you can download it yourself and take a look. It’s page 124 as I said above.

 

[Mh59]

I haven’t read the manual for the wipers but can confirm there is no button on the end of the stalk for the wipers.

Mine is a UK vehicle.

 

[Pugwash]

I haven’t read the manual for the wipers but can confirm there is no button on the end of the stalk for the wipers.

Mine is a UK vehicle.

Now that is interesting. See screenshot below from the manual I downloaded when I just googled Lotus Emira Manual. It is dated Aug 22 so maybe something has changed in the implementation. Do you have a rain sensor symbol on the dash!

 

[duff]

Now that is interesting. See screenshot below from the manual I downloaded when I just googled Lotus Emira Manual. It is dated Aug 22 so maybe something has changed in the implementation. Do you have a rain sensor symbol on the dash!
View attachment 21842

You push it back, or at least that is how I interpreted it.

That said I don't ever remember seeing a rain symbol on the dash.

 

[Concept24]

It is a bit unclear. It seems as if leaving the stalk down means manual mode is active unless you either move the stalk up or press the ambiguous "button" on the stalk. Does the stalk have to be in the up position when you press the "button"?

 

[Pugwash]

You push it back, or at least that is how I interpreted it.

That said I don't ever remember seeing a rain symbol on the dash.

I am speculating a bit as that was how the system in my wife’s MINI worked. There was a button on the end of the stalk which you pushed to switch it from intermittent to rain sensing and back. It looked just like the one in the picture. And a light came on on the dash to tell you.

 

[Pugwash]

The manual shows a button on the other stalk used for resetting things. I assumed the wiper stalk was the same. @Mh59 do you have one that looks like that on your light stalk?