While visiting a site, I saw a pop-up video showing how to make you own windshield washer fluid: a gallon of water, a tablespoon of dish soap, and a half cup of ammonia. Bad idea.

Many years ago, I thought I was being clever when I added some dish soap to water to make my own washer fluid. It worked fine, until the soap plugged up the spray heads. Maybe a tablespoon isn't enough to plug up the nozzles, and maybe the ammonia will hep prevent that, but I'll stick with the stuff sold in stores.

 

dish soap is bad news for clear coat. I'd avoid for sure

 

Another good reason.

 

But it's in the internet, so it must be true.

 

Of course! That solution will clean your windshield. What it will do to the nozzles is another situation entirely. :)

 

Yeah not worth it to save maybe $5 a year.

 

The reason is that there is no antimicrobial action to that mixture - allowing microbes (bacterial, yeast, mold, fungus to grow and clog up the piping and nozzles). A standard WSW fluid has methanol or ethanol and addition additives for Summer (DMDM hydantoin and iodopropylbutylcarbamate).

 

Yes, that's a silly way to save a dollar. One tip I want to share in preparation for winter is to check the freezing temperature specifications of window washer fluid on retailer's shelves. Before I learned the hard way, I figured that retailers would sell only products that respected local winter temperatures. I was wrong. Bought washer fluid at Wal-Mart which later froze and split my reservoir tank.