Rain-sensing wipers driving me nuts!

[NigelM]

Have recent experiences with the wipers been better (eg: with recent firmware updates)?

My wipers have been fine since Oct 2012. I think satisfaction with the wipers may really depend on what you were used to in the past.

My car will be ready in a week or two, and it's raining here in the SF bay area.

Hopefully it will stop raining by then. ;-)

 

[MassModel3]

I was just thinking this weekend of telling the SC to check the wiper sensitivity on the loaner I have. On my 17-month old Model S, the intermittent rain-sensing wipers are awesome! In the loaner I currently have -- maybe 2 months old -- the intermittent wipers are extremely inconsistent. I can leave them in the more aggressive mode, and they'll kick in for light rain while failing to kick in for more aggressive downpours. Bizarre.

 

[AnOutsider]

Mine are still iffy. In fact, it rained the other day and I was constantly right on the verge of pressing the manual wipe button when it did finally wipe.

 

[DieAbetic]

My car is a month old, and the sensors are a little iffy as well. Worked perfectly most the time, but other times too much on light rain and too little on heavy rain. Like AnOutsider, I was right on the verge of tapping manual and then they turned on.

 

[DrComputer]

Not like we've gotten much rain here in Los Angeles over the past year, but when it did rain last week I was reminded how bad the auto-sensing wipers are. Although they have tweaked the algorithm a few times since I got my car over two years ago, they still are not on par with other manufacturers auto-sensing wipers. Seems like it might be more of a hardware sensor issue than just a software tweak. Just another thing Tesla needs to improve.

 

[Robert.Boston]

Lots of opportunities to test the intermittent wipers here in Maine. (Water is one of our big exports.) I'm pretty happy with the intermittent-high setting except when the rain is fairly steady. Instead of just shifting to a nice steady rhythm (=on-low), it keeps flipping from going really fast, then normal, then intermittent, and so on. In these conditions I just flip the wipers to on-low until the rain lets up.

 

[mknox]

Instead of just shifting to a nice steady rhythm (=on-low), it keeps flipping from going really fast, then normal, then intermittent, and so on. In these conditions I just flip the wipers to on-low until the rain lets up.

Same here. I also find in drizzly conditions, they seem to work fine for the first few miles, giving wipes as needed, but eventually the interval between wipes becomes too long and I find myself having to constantly tap the end of the turn signal. These are conditions where On-Low would be too much, so manually selecting wipes is my only option. Even going to the more sensitive Auto setting doesn't help. Weird that it seems to work okay at first and then get gradually worse.

 

[Doug_G]

It's never worked right. They did make some tweaks that improved things modestly, but it's still wholly inadequate. I've just learned to live with it. The auto wipers in my previous G37 were far from perfect, but the Model S wipers are very imperfect.

Specific complaints: It will often allow the windshield to become completely obscured without doing anything. In moderate rain it will switch back and forth between intermittent, regular, and high speed wiping at the drop of a hat. If you just start the car and intermittent wipers are already on, and the windshield is already obscured, then it doesn't wipe - you have to push the manual button to kick it off.

My impression is that the threshold for starting the wipers up is too high, then once it's going the threshold for going to high speed is much too low.

Clearly the wiper algorithm does some rain rate averaging; but I think they need a "fast attack, slow decay" algorithm. It's annoying when the wipers run too much, but it's dangerous when they don't wipe enough.

 

[AnOutsider]

If you just start the car and intermittent wipers are already on, and the windshield is already obscured, then it doesn't wipe - you have to push the manual button to kick it off.

Wasn't this a fix to stop soaking drivers who opened the door (thus waking the car)? Though, I agree it could do a start-up wipe once you're seated and hit the brake.

 

[NielsChr]

I never using the whipers, they are always in off position.

Have nano coating on the windshield and rain just run of by the wind force. no need for whipers


I'm using the "Alaska HD nitro" (on entire car) - works perfect and last 6-12 months.

 

[omarsultan]

The rain-sensing algorithm is not a strong suit on the car - I much prefer the approach in my decade old Jeep Auto > Low > Medium > High. If rain-sensing is working properly, I am not sure why you need two rain-sensing modes and because you cannot see the wiper stalk, I can never tell which mode I am in anyway.

 

[jerry33]

I do the following: 1) Clean the windows with Chemical Guys pomegranate window cleaner. 2) Press the wiper stalk when necessary.

 

[Todd Burch]

I haven't had any complaints with the wipers since a software update maybe a year ago.