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Stock Problems/IssuesDiscussions related to warranty related issues and repairs, or other problems with the OEM parts and software for MINI Clubman (R55), Cooper and Cooper S(R56), and Cabrio (R57).
Greetings Everyone, Mini noob here but I’ve been wrenching on cars for a long time. I’m trying to help my father in law out with his 2015 Roadster S.
The wipers have completely stopped working. We’ve replaced both relays (R5 and R7) which made no difference. I can pull R5 and jumper contacts 3 and 5 and the wipers will come on, so it isn’t a problem with the wiper motor, ground, or power source. I’ve checked contacts 1 and 2 when the wiper stalk is activated and am getting no change so something isn’t activating the relay. The washer pump will run and spray. Just no wipers with it.
Since the wiper stalk is a momentary switch, I assume there is an ECU or some other type of controller that reads the wiper stalk and then activates the wipers. Anyone have any more info on this or a wiring diagram? Where should I look next?
Well, this may not help you (because it wasn't what I expected) but I did find the issue and fix it.
Turns out there is a nice little cubby attached to the bottom of the engine bay fuse block. The cubby (actually a wiring protector) makes a really attractive place for a mouse to nest, apparently. After troubleshooting all the switches and such, I was about to give up and call it a potential body control module (BC1) issue, but I found a few empty acorn hulls here and there and decided to look at the wiring more closely. I removed the two 10mm bolts that hold the fuse block down (disconnected the battery first) and was able to rotate it back towards the firewall about 90 degrees. The lower portion of the fuse block will slide off and expose more of the wiring. After doing that, I could see what is pictured above. The little sucker(s) took about a one inch piece out of three wires and chewed (but didn't break) a couple more. I cleaned it up and spliced/soldered/heatshrinked patches in and and everything was working again.
The main cause was that my father in law was out of the country for 2.5 weeks and the car sat in his basement garage the whole time without being moved. I let him know he needs to deal with the mice.
