[Mk2] [Generic] Rogue quad headlights wiring mod

[craig]

I didn't hook up my lights to your diagram, I had them wired to the diagram I posted. That diagram I posted doesn't show the factory wiring side of the wiring. Neither does it show the main beam indicator.

Now I'm really confused... you didn't actually use my instructions?

Personal preference. I would rather have true quad lights (all four the same when on) rather than a 55W and a 5W bulb lit. Plus as I say, couldn't see the point as sidelights are already present in the front lenses.

I'll take a photo or video when it becomes dusk so you can see what my lights are actually doing. Because I've no idea how much more "true" quad you can get other than mine with the lenses supplied in the Rogue kit.

No, I didn't use your diagram. When I saw that you'd fed the dipped beam off the sidelight wire, I dismissed it.

I thought you were talking about the factory side light wire, not the sidelight in the Rogue headlight. I didn't even know there were sidelights in the Rogue lights till a few days ago!

Mine are quad in the sense that the dipped beams stay on, with the main beams on, not mismatched wattage bulbs lit up across all 4 lights.
In mine, I simply have no bulbs fitted in the sidelights in the main beam lenses, because I don't need them.

[shinny]

When I saw that you'd fed the dipped beam off the sidelight wire, I dismissed it.

What you mean is:

"When I failed to understand your wiring diagram, I told everyone that this mod makes your car fail MOTs"



A much more useful discourse would have been...

You: Hey, am I reading this right? Are you really running your dipped beams from the sidelight circuit? That sounds crazy
Me: No, that's not what's happening and, yes, that would be crazy. The sidelight bulbs shown are the ones built into the Hella main beam lens to create the quad-light look
You: Oh, that wasn't clear to me
Me: I see your point. I'll try to make the original post clearer for the next person. Is there anything else I can clarify for you?

As it is, there's a wildly inaccurate statement trying to warn people off this mod based on a misunderstanding. Once I've made the original post clearer, I'll probably request a mod tidies up the thread because it injects completely unnecessary confusion.

[craig]

Well if your wiring diagram was clearer I would have understood it. It wasn't just me either. A few others were confused by it.

I'll quite happily admit I misunderstood the wiring diagram. Both ways work. But mine takes care of the additional current load by doubling up the wiring.

[C35Rob]

[androo007]

I / mine / me = Peters / Peters / Peter?

[shinny]

Well if your wiring diagram was clearer I would have understood it. It wasn't just me either. A few others were confused by it.

I'll quite happily admit I misunderstood the wiring diagram.

You know the wiring diagram is based on Toyota's schematic for the headlights and features no part of the sidelight circuit other than the "Tail" position on the switch, right?

After 3 1/2 years of the thread being live and having linked to it plenty of times in various discussions, you were the first person to say anything about thinking I've piggybacked on the sidelight circuit.

But mine takes care of the additional current load by doubling up the wiring.

So according to the diagram, on high beam it draws 9A through the ex-LH fuse. When the low beams are lit, 9A is also drawn through the ex-RH fuse. This is exactly the double current thing you're complaining about with my wiring. The only way around this is to have spliced additional wires directly at the fuse box and run second lines.

If you spliced into the fuse box, then that's great for you. Personally, I'm happy to trust Toyota that wiring protected by a 15A fuse will be capable of handling at least 15A (otherwise the fuse is pointless, right?) so I have absolutely no issue running 9A on it. You're free to be paranoid about that if you want though.

Both ways work.

I'm genuinely happy your car works. But to have a functional high beam indicator, you simply cannot be wired according to your/Peter's diagram. Do you need me to prove it with an electrical simulation tool?

Also, that pair of relays is somewhat superfluous unless you're running HID low beams. For a fully halogen setup, there's no point in wiring in two extra relays IMHO.

[shinny]

Love it!

[shinny]

Right, I shot a video showing exactly what the result of my wiring mod is: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fNX8-s1aEfw

You can see why I have the 4W 233 bulbs wired up in the main beam housing, providing an (aooarently "untrue"!?) quad look on both low and high beam.

[C35Rob]

There's only one way to solve this 'my lights are better than yours' argument.

(FF to 2 mins)

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=TEBdE2oR48s

Now make it happen.

[BrianUK]

Thank you very, very much for this article - I came up with something similar - but got complete confused trying to sort out why the main beam indicator wasn't working!

I managed to buy a new pair of BMAC LED headlights which I have now fitted to my MR2 - they are brilliant and as they only consume 18 watts each I wanted to do this wiring mod.

Two (constructive) comments for you though:

1) Consider replacing "sidelight" with "marker light" - it may save confusion! These marker lights have a practical use in that they act as anti condensation heaters. Not wiring them in is a definite MOT failure by the way.. If a light is fitted - it must work.....

2) The black switched dipped beam ground and 12V source for main beam indicator goes to a Red/Blue wire on the car's wiring - why do I say this - well:

• No matter how many times I check my car the wire is definitely Red/Blue
  Your diagram has it coloured Red/Blue
  The colour code against the wire in your diagram (and on every other diagram I have of the headlight wiring) is R/L. R - for Red, L = for Blue. (cant use B - that's black)
  

Regards

Brian

[shinny]

Thank you very, very much for this article - I came up with something similar - but got complete confused trying to sort out why the main beam indicator wasn't working!

You're very welcome - glad it was helpful.

1) Consider replacing "sidelight" with "marker light" - it may save confusion! These marker lights have a practical use in that they act as anti condensation heaters. Not wiring them in is a definite MOT failure by the way.. If a light is fitted - it must work.....

Yup, I totally need to do that, after the "fun" you can see above.

2) The black switched dipped beam ground and 12V source for main beam indicator goes to a Red/Blue wire on the car's wiring - why do I say this - well:

• No matter how many times I check my car the wire is definitely Red/Blue
  Your diagram has it coloured Red/Blue
  The colour code against the wire in your diagram (and on every other diagram I have of the headlight wiring) is R/L. R - for Red, L = for Blue. (cant use B - that's black)
  

Interesting. On my car it was definitely red/green, not red/blue. The diagram is from USA cars and I noted that there was a discrepancy here. I'll make a note that either colour is possible.

[craig]

These marker lights have a practical use in that they act as anti condensation heaters. Not wiring them in is a definite MOT failure by the way.. If a light is fitted - it must work.....

Incorrect. The car will not fail an MOT for not having the sidelights in the main beam unit wired.

These are only required, say, on a kit car, where no other sidelights are present. The MR2 has sidelights as standard in the front indicator lenses, therefore the sidelights in the main beam unit are not required.

Rogue only used these in the kit, as they're cheaper than the non sidelight unit to keep the costs of production down.

Not convinced on condensation issues either. The unit is only a 90mm unit with a condensation tube in it.

[shinny]

Additional sidelights / marker lights aren't on the MOT so a tester shouldn't care whether they're used or not. My car passes MOT every year with them hooked up; plenty of others won't have them hooked up and they should pass MOT without comment too.

More interesting is whether they're allowed in the 1989 vehicle lighting regulations. They're probably in contravention of that for a three reasons, the least pedantic being that they're a set of lights that move (you know, pop-up) that aren't dipped beam, main beam or fog lights. That said, the common quad light wiring mod on rear lights contravenes the regulations if you wire in the diodes to use the fog lights as brake lights and again if you remove the UK spec reflectors and thus have a fog light within 10cm of a brake light. Heck, using bulbs that aren't E-marked (which includes most chromed indicator bulbs and pretty much every LED bulb) also contravenes the regulations! Go figure...

So yes, the rogue lights (with or without this mod) should pass MOT just fine. I think the mod makes the quad headlights make much more sense in operation, but it's your choice whether you wire it onto your car or not.

[craig]

Additional sidelights / marker lights aren't on the MOT so a tester shouldn't care whether they're used or not. My car passes MOT every year with them hooked up; plenty of others won't have them hooked up and they should pass MOT without comment too.

More interesting is whether they're allowed in the 1989 vehicle lighting regulations. They're probably in contravention of that for a three reasons, the least pedantic being that they're a set of lights that move (you know, pop-up) that aren't dipped beam, main beam or fog lights. That said, the common quad light wiring mod on rear lights contravenes the regulations if you wire in the diodes to use the fog lights as brake lights and again if you remove the UK spec reflectors and thus have a fog light within 10cm of a brake light. Heck, using bulbs that aren't E-marked (which includes most chromed indicator bulbs and pretty much every LED bulb) also contravenes the regulations! Go figure...

So yes, the rogue lights (with or without this mod) should pass MOT just fine. I think the mod makes the quad headlights make much more sense in operation, but it's your choice whether you wire it onto your car or not.

[Ryan S]

I / mine / me = Peters / Peters / Peter?

I lolled 😂

[BrianUK]

Hi again

Cut the thick red wire with a blue stripe under the steering column (if you fail to do this, you'll blow fuses and / or melt wiring). On some cars, such as mine, this wire might have a green stripe instead.

Can you confirm the location of this wire - I cant find it lol - the only (thick) Red/Blue wire I can find goes into the back of the ignition lock barrel...

Cheers - Brian

[shinny]

Hi again

Cut the thick red wire with a blue stripe under the steering column (if you fail to do this, you'll blow fuses and / or melt wiring). On some cars, such as mine, this wire might have a green stripe instead.

Can you confirm the location of this wire - I cant find it lol - the only (thick) Red/Blue wire I can find goes into the back of the ignition lock barrel...

Cheers - Brian

I'll try to grab a photo for you in a bit...

[BrianUK]

Cheers buddy - studying the wiring diagrams it looks to me as thought its the (thin) Blue/Red wire going to position 3 on Block connector C15 - mounted directly under the steering column...

Regards

Brian

[shinny]

Cheers buddy - studying the wiring diagrams it looks to me as thought its the (thin) Blue/Red wire going to position 3 on Block connector C15 - mounted directly under the steering column...

Regards

Brian

The wire is about 2mm thick (which I was defining as thick compared to other wires in the bundle). In the stock wiring, it grounds about 9A of current from the dipped beam filaments, so it must be chunky enough to cope with that. But yes, pin 3 on C15.

Heres a photo of the wire I cut:


It looks like I cut it deep within the wiring loom, probably because I had the low dash trim off at the time.

[androo007]

I / mine / me = Peters / Peters / Peter?

I lolled 😂

Poor Pete only jesting