1999 BMW 328i (E46) – Windshield Washer Fluid Refill And Front Left Turn Signal & Low Beam Replacement

Hey Guys,

Continuing on with the 328i project, in this video we’re replacing all the burnt out front lights and refilling the windshield washer fluid reservoir. We mainly decided to do this at this point instead of the oil change because our building wasn’t quite ready for use yet. Nothing really seriously difficult in this video, the main thing is to make sure you purchase the proper bulbs for each socket. It’s likely that even if you purchase the wrong bulb, it won’t fit due to them having little pieces that jut out preventing you from placing them in the wrong socket.

Three things that we learned about the car coming out of this video are:
1. We have a leak from the windshield washer reservoir. That meant that the 3 litres or so of new fluid I dumped in ended up soaking into the ground where the car is parked. It’s likely due to faulty seals on the headlight washer jets, which I believe this car has. We will investigate and fix this issue as it’s not economical to have to dump windshield washer fluid in there constantly.
2. We’ll likely need to replace the low beam/high beam lens since over time it’s likely the low beam bulb will eventually fall out of its socket. This is fine since I intend to replace it in the future anyway
3. The broken turn signal lens actually fell out of the car later that afternoon. The next video, will cover me installing a cheap aftermarket replacement lens that I will use as a stop gap solution.

Additionally, we filmed some content on the rear taillights, but we got confused between the diagrams in the Bentley Service Manual and what we saw on the car. As it turns out by browsing the bulb page on German Parts, you can get these lights in one or two filament varieties. Since, as of May 2021 we haven’t returned to this part of the project due to a big coolant leak and hose replacement job that will be featured in some videos later this month and in July (after the upcoming rear main seal series), we decided to pull the footage of the rear lights and will feature it in a future video where we finish up the job.