From my experience last winter the Fabia washer & wipers system doesn't like 'extreme' cold - last winter two recurring problems:

1. The system's pipes fall off, leading to sudden total loss of screen wash ability, which with the amount of salt the Highways Agency is promising to chuck about, is not a nice situation to be in as the salt thrown up by others sticks on the windscreen.

2. The pump system ices up easily, which leads to a fuse blowing should it try and move ice through it when you activate the washers. This then leads to very strange behaviour on the windscreen wipers, where they only work on intermittent when you move the stalk 'forward', which normally activates the rear wiper (which doesn't function at all with the fuse gone). Again, not great in poor weather.

So before this cold weather we've been promised strikes, make sure you put plenty of screen wash that contains an anti-freeze (not diluted too much), in the washer reservoir and pump it through (dealer's suggestion to the probs outlined above).

Use VAG screenwash 750mls in the2.5l standard tank gives you protection down to -16!

Which costs

Its down to -37c in Canada at the moment, I wonder what they use for screen wash there??

Andy C

Ah now if you use VAG screenwash I've calculated for a 2.5l furby tank.......

...................water (ml)......screenwash (ml)

summer..........2000.................500

-16...............1750.................750

-35...............1250................1250

-40................750.................1750

Apparently no screenwash in Canada at -37 as it would break the water bottle! Think of all the zealous cops dishing out

Berlin temperatures went down to circa -20

so thats why your such a windows licker is it Denis...

Diesel in your tank would be frozen at that temp!

I don't know where but I've seen pictures of Russian truck drivers keeping fires lit under their trucks to keep the diesel from freezing. I know diesel has different ignition properties to petrol but :eek: none the less.

Just a tad, diesel gives off a vapour at 70oC (hence glow plugs and compression ignition to get it to ignite) whereas petrol gives off a vapour at +45oC. In theory you can use diesel to put out petrol fires but i would not do it (although i heard somewhere that is what they do on the oil rigs).

Just a tad, diesel gives off a vapour at 70oC (hence glow plugs and compression ignition to get it to ignite) whereas petrol gives off a vapour at +45oC. In theory you can use diesel to put out petrol fires but i would not do it (although i heard somewhere that is what they do on the oil rigs).

I think you mean -45degC

I was at a lecture once where the lecturer explained that the ash on the end of a cigarette acted in the same way as the mesh in a flame arrestor. He then demonstrated this by putting out a Marlboro in a cup of petrol :guapo:

Steve

I think you mean -45degC

I was at a lecture once where the lecturer explained that the ash on the end of a cigarette acted in the same way as the mesh in a flame arrestor. He then demonstrated this by putting out a Marlboro in a cup of petrol :guapo:

Steve

Did you get your coat?

Did you get your coat?

no but i'll get mine, i pushed the wrong button (so much for two years learning car mechanics and having to take a fire course every year on the underground eh)

A guy gave a demostration of a CO2 fire extinguiser at 2pm on a hot day on a fire safety course. It really scared the **** out of me!

I don't know where but I've seen pictures of Russian truck drivers keeping fires lit under their trucks to keep the diesel from freezing. I know diesel has different ignition properties to petrol but :eek: none the less.

Had my mate Pug Deisel Turbo freeze up in the Scottish Highlands a few years back. We didn't bother lighting a fire under it - just stayed in and drank lots instead of coming home.