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It's impossible to know why. Maybe it was a marketing / cost cutting decision. I think it sucks. Being able to see to drive at night shouldn't require pulling off the road to wipe down headlamps.
Here's an image I just now grabbed from Lexus Germany showing that the current IS there still has headlight washers.
If you want headlamp washers you could probably install an aftermarket kit. For example, Hella Germany makes a variety of kits of both the pop-up and fixed types. I bought one of the fixed Hella headlamp washer kits for our Toyota Sienna van on eBay Germany for around US$100 - installation was quite involved but I'm used to ripping vehicles apart. Here's a photo showing the spray nozzles on the Sienna's bumper.
From what I have read in the forum the washer is mandatory in the EU, it was more a curiosity on my part as I have never really had an issue in the past but I see it's benefit. Thanks for the insight.
Is it possible that it's part of an option package?
I have an F Sport Series II and it has the washers...I would imagine a Series III would also have them. I believe the Series I doesn't however.
In the luxury package line of the model I'm not sure when it was part of the package though.
The headlamp washers are part of the ‘winter package’, so I specifically shopped for used IS’s that had that package when I bought mine. The package also included the heated steering wheel, wiper heater, and upgraded interior heater/fan.
The headlamp washers are part of the ‘winter package’, so I specifically shopped for used IS’s that had that package when I bought mine. The package also included the heated steering wheel, wiper heater, and upgraded interior heater/fan.
Your profile says you have a 2014 IS350 AWD. 2014 appears to be the last model year that headlamp washers were available in an option package on the IS sold in the U.S. It's shown in the 2014 IS sales brochure as:
Headlamp washers are required in Europe only for headlamps that produce more than 2,000 lumens although some car makers provide them for headlamps that produce less. The primary purpose of headlamp washers and the only reason they are sometimes required in Europe is to reduce glare for oncoming drivers. I want headlamp washers primarily so I can see better at night while driving in winter slush ... might not be as big a problem if we weren't so darned old with declining night vision.
I have them on my 2014 FSport too. How do I activate them? Same switch as the windshield washer?
From the 2014 IS owners manual for Canada:
Washer/wiper dual operation
The wipers will automatically operate a
couple of times after the washer squirts.
Vehicles with headlight cleaners: When
the headlights are on and the lever is
pulled and held, the headlight cleaners
will operate once. After this, the headlight cleaners will operate every 5th
time the lever is pulled.
In Germany all Cars with Xenon lamps must have a washer. It’s by law...so many strange laws here...dirt is breaking the light and the rays could blind you when you come from the other direction etc etc etc.....
In the IS the washer activates after pulling 5x wiper washer.
Your profile says you have a 2014 IS350 AWD. 2014 appears to be the last model year that headlamp washers were available in an option package on the IS sold in the U.S. It's shown in the 2014 IS sales brochure as:
Headlamp washers are required in Europe only for headlamps that produce more than 2,000 lumens although some car makers provide them for headlamps that produce less. The primary purpose of headlamp washers and the only reason they are sometimes required in Europe is to reduce glare for oncoming drivers. I want headlamp washers primarily so I can see better at night while driving in winter slush ... might not be as big a problem if we weren't so darned old with declining night vision.
Seems like headlamp washers should be required on any car with LED headlamps. Old headlamps produced heat that melted the crud off the lamps while driving in a snowstorm. These new-fangled LEDS produce no heat, so the crap just piles up on the lenses until you can't see anymore, a real safety issue.
Thanks for the tip about the European laws. That explains why the headlamp washers were not an option on my other car (made in England), just standard on all models (the same with the rear fog lights, never heard of them before I got that car).
LEDs generating heat depend on the LED used and I would have thought a headlight LED would get hot. seems the after market amazon LED turn signal lights (2018 3IS LED conversion thread in the build section) over heat if used for too long.
LEDs generating heat depend on the LED used and I would have thought a headlight LED would get hot. seems the after market amazon LED turn signal lights (2018 3IS LED conversion thread in the build section) over heat if used for too long.
Think the difference is that if you are using an aftermarket LED in a circuit designed for an incandescent, they need to build in a resistive load so the car thinks it still has an incandescent load and doesn’t throw an error.
In a circuit designed for an LED lamp, like the OEM LED headlamps, there is no need for a higher current draw, so the lamps run cooler.
So the European law requirement for headlight washers is simplistically mandating that all hi-power beams (e.g. Xenon) must have washing systems. The actual reasoning behind is more complex and it is based on research and engineering feedback. Some users above here have come close to the point but basically the reasoning is this:
The high-power discharge lamps (Xenon or strong halogens) both release high heat and also focus all the beam into a small area.
In the winter, the heat is normally sufficient that is melts the snow off the headlights (except in severe blizzards) so the washers are not needed. More so, if the snow is too thick and fluffy, the jets will simply be absorbed (think to a similar case similar to...he he..."golden snow") so again will not work. Then, in very low temperatures (around -40 C), most probably that the spray would rapidly freeze anyways so again no effectiveness. So to summarize, the headlight washers are not targeting the winter environment, but more the rainy-muddy autumn-spring ones, where you have a lot of dirt projected to the headlights, and due to the high localized heating from the beam, it drys out (lower temperature headlights with less heat remain humid and give a chance to humid dirt to smear off), so it continuously builds up dirt and completely obscures the headlight glass. This has two basic effects: on short-term, it seriously affects the visibility, which is a hazardous case for the drivers, and on long-term it strongly affects the bulbs and headlight assembly reliability, as it seriously decreases their lifetime due to higher temperatures than designed.
As for the LEDs, they are also generating less heat and are also more distributed to the headlight area so normally they behave thermally like older low-power bulbs, remaining humid so it is not that critical to use headlight washers for LED headlights. I think that in this case it is more of a "got-used-to" feature which remained as standard in some cases, or simply has been deleted in others.
