Fogs with High Beams on Mod!!! Write-up with Pictures!!!

[M3Alpine99]

One good reason is if you have Fog HIDs, so that they do not turn on and off all the time. (This is totally independent of if it is a good idea to have Fog HIDs in the first place or if it is helpful to have both Fogs and Highs on at the same time.)

Well I can safely say with my HID headlights and depos turning on the high beams has no advantage except it lights up part of the trees...

So I don't see an advantage to really use them. I guess if you are a road rager and like to flash your brights alot it could be a cool mod?

[M3Alpine99]

I SWEAR you were reading my mind.

I saw the subject..like it was some sort of BREAKING NEWS.

Ive been driving in America for a LOONG time now, and I've YET to encounter some sort of special darkness that requires me to violate laws and have SIX forward lights on simultaneously. WTF.

If we combine this thread..with the "Piaa PLASMA ION" thread....the entire internet will be blinded.

The last time I truely needed more than 4 forward lights was night time offroad in my jeep wrangler. I had my fogs/headlights/and 4 driving lights on. I was leading so it did help in that situation. I can't think of an on road situation this would be truly necessary

[clumpymold]

The last time I truely needed more than 4 forward lights was night time offroad in my jeep wrangler. I had my fogs/headlights/and 4 driving lights on. I was leading so it did help in that situation. I can't think of an on road situation this would be truly necessary

Well, it's kinda like those granny drivers who buy M3s or even Ferraris but never drive the car very fast. When you ask them about it, they simply answer, "well, I just like to have the OPTION of having the power when I need it".

Same goes for this mod. You don't have to use it if you don't want to. But if you ever feel you need to use it, it's there.

[AvusBlua M3]

Ok, they are aimed so low because they are FOG lights. To be used when there is FOG. In FOG, or snow, even low beams will cause so much glare you might not be able to see anything. The fog lights light up the edge of the road, a short distance ahead, so that you can see something and not crash. When you do a H7 or HID mod to the FOG light you remove the shield around the blub. The shield is what keeps the lights from blinding other drivers. Yes several companies make driving lights for our cars, just but for the fog light replacement. It would make no sense to put driving lights that low. Rant off. sorry

Stop baggin old-timer!!! ^ support the man... its not like he's demanding you to do it to your car.... but ANYWAY!! nice mod man... looks good!

[M3Alpine99]

Well, it's kinda like those granny drivers who buy M3s or even Ferraris but never drive the car very fast. When you ask them about it, they simply answer, "well, I just like to have the OPTION of having the power when I need it".

Same goes for this mod. You don't have to use it if you don't want to. But if you ever feel you need to use it, it's there.

I guess it is kind of like that. But when you have the ferrari you feel and can use the power.

When you turn the high beams on it washes out what the fogs are doing anyways so what is the point of having them on?

[exodus454]

Just did the mod, well written

The only thing I found confusing though was the part about the brown wire. Took me a few minutes to realize that you didn't mean a brown wire attached to the fog relay, but another ground in the fuse box.

I also found the job MUCH easier to do if you disconnect the two engine harness connectors mounted to the fuse box. Another thing I found very useful was once I had the box open, I popped the relay holder for the fogs out through the bottom of the fuse panel to give me more wire slack and to be able to get to things more easily. It took 30 seconds to do, grab both the tabs from the underside and push it out through the bottom.

To all those who don't seem to agree with this mod, I think you're right that it's silly. But, if you have HID's in your fogs like I just put in, I'd rather minimize the on-off of the ballasts. And I do think HID fogs are worth it - just because the stock fogs don't do crap!

3000k fogs ftw!

[M///BMW]

They should have used your car for "I Am Legend".

Bright Lights---FTW.

[Dricebrug]

They should have used your car for "I Am Legend".

Bright Lights---FTW.

lol

[clumpymold]

Just did the mod, well written

The only thing I found confusing though was the part about the brown wire. Took me a few minutes to realize that you didn't mean a brown wire attached to the fog relay, but another ground in the fuse box.

I also found the job MUCH easier to do if you disconnect the two engine harness connectors mounted to the fuse box. Another thing I found very useful was once I had the box open, I popped the relay holder for the fogs out through the bottom of the fuse panel to give me more wire slack and to be able to get to things more easily. It took 30 seconds to do, grab both the tabs from the underside and push it out through the bottom.

To all those who don't seem to agree with this mod, I think you're right that it's silly. But, if you have HID's in your fogs like I just put in, I'd rather minimize the on-off of the ballasts. And I do think HID fogs are worth it - just because the stock fogs don't do crap!

3000k fogs ftw!

Hmm, I'll have to look into that. Thanks for the compliments though!

They should have used your car for "I Am Legend".

Bright Lights---FTW.

Haha, thanks!

lol

[yellow360f]

How do you set the light on high setting and low settting ? i noticed that in some pics they are dim and the last pic very bright. ??????
Did you do anything to the light switch also? plz explain the procedure.

[giterdone]

How do you set the light on high setting and low settting ? i noticed that in some pics they are dim and the last pic very bright. ??????
Did you do anything to the light switch also? plz explain the procedure.

Probably just the angel of the camera to the lights. Depending on how you take the pic (angle, camera setting, etc), HIDs will appear many different ways. I have pics where mine appear green (as does clumpy's in some pics) when they are far from green in real life.

[clumpymold]

How do you set the light on high setting and low settting ? i noticed that in some pics they are dim and the last pic very bright. ??????
Did you do anything to the light switch also? plz explain the procedure.

I get this question the most, by far.

The light settings are on my CAMERA NOT my HIDs. I can adjust the light that enters the camera (most digital cameras have this). So, the more light I let in, the brighter the HIDs appear. The less light entering, the dimmer they appear.

[roarf]

I am considering doing this soon, as I just installed HIDs in my fogs. Just to be sure, you connected those two blue connectors you have shown in the picture, right? So basically what you are doing is taking the red/white wire from the highs/fogs relay, cutting it, and splicing it to ground. That right? Personally, I would have soldered the spliced joint to make sure it was good and solid and didn't cause any future problems to arise. I imagine it would be a little tight getting a soldering iron in there though.

[ozarkbikeracer1]

I just did this fix, and it works great! I wanted to do it mostly because I don't like my fogs cycling on and off. That's got to shorten the life of those bulbs considerably. Thanks for a great write up!

[roarf]

Did you have any trouble w/ getting at the wires and getting the fuse box back in place ok? I've heard the fuse box is a major bitch to mess with.

[typeS4]

Awesome DIY

[ozarkbikeracer1]

Did you have any trouble w/ getting at the wires and getting the fuse box back in place ok? I've heard the fuse box is a major bitch to mess with.

It was a lot easier than I thought it would be. All the wires were very accessible, and identifiable. The brown wire that I tapped into is from the relay marked "ABS Pump Relay". The hardest part was getting the screws next to the firewall in and out. I just used a 1/4" u-joint to solve that problem. It's a great fix, and well worth the effort.

[clumpymold]

Thanks for all the compliments, fellas! Glad to know this thread is still around.

[Mpowered02]

Just looking at this old thread since i'm thinking about making the same mod to the fog wiring on my car. Not running fog lights anymore, but planning on using that circuit as a switching circuit for some Xenon driving lights i'm working on. Anyway, I think I can shed a bit of light (no pun intended) on the function of the stock fog light circuit as it seems there's some confusion as to how the fog relay is grounded in the stock configuration.

If you look at the wiring diagram, the coil side of the fog light relay gets it's ground through the high beam relay. That line T's into terminal 87 at the high beam relay. When the high beam relay is not active, the ground path for the fog light relay is down to the high beam relay, through terminal 87, through fuses F29 and F30, through both high beam headlights, and down to chassis ground.
When the high beam relay is activated, the switch between terminals 30 and 87 of the high beam relay closes allowing current to flow to the high beam bulbs. This knocks out the ground supply to the fog light relay as terminal 87 of the high beam relay then becomes a +12V supply. The fog light relay at this point now has +12v at both sides of the coil, deactivating the relay. Hope that makes sense...sorry to resurrect such an old thread, but I thought it might help...

[AlmostStock]

cool look- my only worry is that it would be alot of load for the generator with them all on

[m2pc]

Just looking at this old thread since i'm thinking about making the same mod to the fog wiring on my car. Not running fog lights anymore, but planning on using that circuit as a switching circuit for some Xenon driving lights i'm working on. Anyway, I think I can shed a bit of light (no pun intended) on the function of the stock fog light circuit as it seems there's some confusion as to how the fog relay is grounded in the stock configuration.

If you look at the wiring diagram, the coil side of the fog light relay gets it's ground through the high beam relay. That line T's into terminal 87 at the high beam relay. When the high beam relay is not active, the ground path for the fog light relay is down to the high beam relay, through terminal 87, through fuses F29 and F30, through both high beam headlights, and down to chassis ground.
When the high beam relay is activated, the switch between terminals 30 and 87 of the high beam relay closes allowing current to flow to the high beam bulbs. This knocks out the ground supply to the fog light relay as terminal 87 of the high beam relay then becomes a +12V supply. The fog light relay at this point now has +12v at both sides of the coil, deactivating the relay. Hope that makes sense...sorry to resurrect such an old thread, but I thought it might help...

This is exactly why when I first got my car, and replaced the fogs, nothing would work (not even the indicator in the dash). Then I looked and saw that the PO had removed the high beam bulbs from the housings, so the fog relay wasn't getting its ground connection!

[SnowBoardinWNY]

Just finished doing this mod, while actually I still have to put the fuse box back together but everything works like it should! Thanks clumpy with a lower case c

I did have one question, is there any problem with the red/white wire being such a small gage? I wouldn't think so because it's like this from the factory but we didn't rig it up like it came from the factory. It seems as tho the people that have done this mod haven't had any issues but I was just curious. I remember the thread where you wired the angel eyes into the foot well light and used a resister but it got pretty warm and others decided to use a larger resistor or two resistors in line. Just looking for some assurance I guess.

I couldn't help but be annoyed by all the negativity in this thread. For one, it made my read much longer because of all the b.s. and two, it's your car, mod it how you please.

Anyways, thanks for the DIY clumpy

[oblivion]

Wish i was that good with wiring, Id prolly have to turn on the windshield wipers to get the right beam to turn on, or something like that...
good job xD

[SnowBoardinWNY]

Wish i was that good with wiring, Id prolly have to turn on the windshield wipers to get the right beam to turn on, or something like that...
good job xD

Thanks

It's really not that hard, I'm not good with wiring and relays and such but I can follow direction. It really is one of the simplest mods you can do, only PITA was getting to the wires and the confined space. I should have soldered mine but I used crimp connectors. The crimper I had, also had a wire cutter and stripper, and the design really made it difficult to crimp the wires in such a small space.

[clumpymold]

Just finished doing this mod, while actually I still have to put the fuse box back together but everything works like it should! Thanks clumpy with a lower case c

I did have one question, is there any problem with the red/white wire being such a small gage? I wouldn't think so because it's like this from the factory but we didn't rig it up like it came from the factory. It seems as tho the people that have done this mod haven't had any issues but I was just curious. I remember the thread where you wired the angel eyes into the foot well light and used a resister but it got pretty warm and others decided to use a larger resistor or two resistors in line. Just looking for some assurance I guess.

I couldn't help but be annoyed by all the negativity in this thread. For one, it made my read much longer because of all the b.s. and two, it's your car, mod it how you please.

Anyways, thanks for the DIY clumpy

You're very welcome. I truly appreciate your comments. And yes, you'll always have haters around. I didn't do this mod for them. I did this for myself and others interested in doing the same thing.

Good question regarding the red wire. But I had no issues up until I sold my car (about a year ago) so I suppose it's okay. I hope so, anyway.

Glad to know that everything worked out well though.

Wish i was that good with wiring, Id prolly have to turn on the windshield wipers to get the right beam to turn on, or something like that...
good job xD

Thanks

It's really not that hard, I'm not good with wiring and relays and such but I can follow direction. It really is one of the simplest mods you can do, only PITA was getting to the wires and the confined space. I should have soldered mine but I used crimp connectors. The crimper I had, also had a wire cutter and stripper, and the design really made it difficult to crimp the wires in such a small space.

Exactly like SnowBoardinWNY said. It's not as hard as you think. Just follow the directions carefully and you'll be fine.