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Rewiring OEM fog lights on an Evo IX for TOTAL CONTROL

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Old Apr 8, 2009, 10:54 PM
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Rewiring OEM fog lights on an Evo IX for TOTAL CONTROL

Perhaps you’re like me, and would like to run your OEM fog lights on your Evo whenever you want... not only with lowbeams on.

And, you did your research on Evom, and found this thread, which sounded REALLY complicated, and unreliable:

https://www.evolutionm.net/forums/ev...s-anytime.html

- and this thread, which forces you to have your fog lights on automatically anytime you have your parking lights on:

https://www.evolutionm.net/forums/ev...ng-lights.html

I personally didn’t want my fogs on every time my parking lights were on, and when I tried this modification on my Evo9, it didn’t work – all it did was make my fog lights not work at all.

So, I decided to rewire the OEM fog light circuit on my Evo IX completely, so that I can control their operation. If you can follow directions, route a few wires and use a wire crimper, you can easily do this modification on your Evo.

Advantages:

You can have the fog lights on or off at your discretion, either with your parking lights on or off... with low beams, or low beams & high beams

Your fog lights will turn off automatically when you pull your key out of the ignition after driving

No issues or side effects that will cause any factory fuses to blow or any kind of electrical weirdness (if you wire everything correctly, of course)

The parts required for this modification cost less than $10 (or might already be in your garage)

Disadvantages:

You’ll have to install an aftermarket switch somewhere on your dash (I opted to install it in the OEM location)

You’ll have to do some very basic wiring work, including running one or two wires from the engine compartment into the interior

The wiring/relay for this setup will add about 5 ounces of weight to your car

If you want to have the OEM fog light indicator in the instrument cluster to light up w fog lights, you’ll have to pull the cluster and wire that lamp into the new circuit as well (I didn't do this; you're have to figure that out for yourself)

Parts needed:
  • 1 standard Bosch-type SPDT (single polarity dual throw) automotive relay
  • About 20’ of 18-gauge wiring, multiple colors preferred
  • About 10 standard crimp-on female spade connectors
  • 3 crimp-on spade or ring terminals
  • 1 ATC-type fuseholder (or you can make one out of female spade connectors)
  • 1 10 or 15-amp ATC-type fuse
  • Zipties and wire loom (optional, to make things pretty)

Tools needed:

  • Wire stripper
  • Crimper
  • 10mm socket & ratchet or 10mm box wrench
  • Multimeter (optional, but nice to have handy)
  • Bench grinder, utility knife, file (for modifying an aftermarket switch to fit the OEM location)
  • Drill & drill bits, wire coat hanger (for routing wires into the cabin)

Disclaimer:


This worked great on my car, and I think it’s a sound way to enable full control over your OEM parking lights. You may disagree. If you wire things wrong, bad things could happen. What you do on your car is your responsibility.

Also, if you run your fog lights along with your highbeams, you’ll probably get some dillholes offended and they’ll feel compelled to flash their highbeams at you. I’d ignore them if I were you.

Here’s the overview of the install: basically, this will completely eliminate the car’s control of the fog lights, and you’ll be creating a new "stand-alone circuit" to run the fogs. EDIT: Because a few people have asked, I don't know if you can utilize the OEM fog light switch to accomplish this. If I did, I'd have used it myself. The factory fog light switch is not a simple, mechanical on/off switch... it contains a self-canceling circuit. Therefore, I chose not to mess with it.

There is only one tie-in to the OEM wiring, and that’s the circuit that triggers the relay and allows the foglights to turn on. In my car and the following pictures, I used the parking light circuit, which means the parking lights must be on for the fog lights to be activated.

However, you could also easily use a ignition circuit, which would mean you’d be able to turn on the foglights whenever the ignition key is inserted and turned to the “ignition” position, whether the engine is on or not, or if any of the other light circuits are on.

The only 12-volt power source that’s tied to the ignition circuit in the fusebox under the hood is the radio circuit, and I didn’t feel comfortable trying to tap into that source because of the weird yellow plastic "box" that couples that 10-amp fuse with another circuit. I may run another wire into the car to tap an ignition-controlled power source in the future, so I don't have to have the parking lights on to have the fog lights light up.

This picture shows an overview of what the wiring you need to create looks like, and its overall orientation in the car:



There will be two wires that go from the fuse box under the hood to the relay. From the relay, there’s one lead that will bring power to the foglight bulbs, as well as a wire that goes to the aftermarket switch inside the car. The switch will need a ground wire, which can be grounded to any bare metal point attached to the unibody of the car. And, each fog light bulb needs a short ground wire too. That’s it!

These two pictures show you where you need to tap into the fuse box. The thin 18-gauge wire simply has the last 1 1/4" of insulation stripped off, and it’s wrapped around one leg of the mini-fuse for the parking light circuit. The thicker, 10-gauge black wire is from a standard fuseholder you can get at any car stereo install shop, and that goes to the main power feed in the fusebox, on the right side of the big, 60-amp fuse.





If you’re sketched out by the hokey connection of the blue wire to the fuse box, there’s no need to be… when you put the 7.5-amp minifuse back into the fusebox, it actually clamps that bare wire into place, and there’s nothing around it to short out on. The plastic fusebox and the top of the fuse itself protect the bare wire you’ve wrapped around the leg of the fuse from contacting anything.

Also, all that blue wire does is feed a low-current signal to activate the coil in the relay – that’s NOT where the power that runs the foglights themselves comes from. That comes through the fuseholder’s much thicker wire, which is secured with a ring terminal under the OEM 10mm-headed bolt.

A view of the connections to the fusebox, plus the Bosch relay and fuseholder:



And this is how the wiring to the individual fog lamp bulbs (H11 type, BTW) look in the car:

Driver’s side:


Passenger side:


Note that there’s a handy spot right on the insides of the headlamp assembly area that serves as a great grounding wire location. It’s a 10mm headed bolt.

Okay, this is how you wire the relay (the bottom of the relay has the identifying #s molded into the plastic case, right next to each tab):

87a (middle tab): nothing
85: blue wire to parking light circuit in fusebox (7.5A fuse) OR any ignition-controlled 12+ source
86: blue wire to the aftermarket fog light switch in-car
87: white wire to fog light bulbs (both of them)
30: thick black wire of the aftermarket fuseholder that is connected to the 60A constant 12+ circuit in fusebox

And here’s a close-up pic of the relay, to help you see where each color goes:



To connect the power and ground wires to the fog light bulbs, you’ll need some "half-size" female spade connectors. They’re a perfect fit for the prongs of the bulb. These connectors are a little hard to find – I went to auto parts stores like Checker and couldn’t find them.

I got them from a car stereo store’s install bay, but I don’t know if every shop would have them. They’re the same size as the small prong on a typical aftermarket car stereo speaker, so worst case scenario, you could make use of one side of the white/gray wiring that usually comes with a set of car audio speakers. Most car stereo shops throw away about 20 packs of that included wiring every day, so if you ask nicely, they’d probably give you that stuff for free.





In this picture, you can see how the white wire from the 87 tab of the relay is connected with a red wire that feeds power over to the passenger-side fog light bulb:



The ground wire is exactly the same for both bulbs. And there’s no polarity with the bulbs – you can use either of the prongs for the "hot" lead or for ground; it doesn’t matter.

You can route the wire between the two fog light bulbs in wire loom, and it’ll fit nicely along the top of the radiator, like this:



Here’s how the wiring looks in the car all covered with loom:

Driver’s side:


Passenger side:


This is the wiring that goes to the switch I used – just a cheapie leftover switch from some aftermarket fog light kit:



The two most difficult or labor-intensive parts of this project is routing the wire to the control switch from the engine compartment to the interior, and making the aftermarket switch fit the OEM fog light switch cutout. You of course don’t need to do it like this, but I did.

This is where I chose to route the power wire for the switch through the firewall. It’s right next to the rubber grommet/hole where the throttle cable goes through:



I’d already drilled a hole in the sheet metal next to the throttle cable opening for my boost gauge line. A 1/4" drill bit is more than big enough. Then, tape the wire for the switch to the end of a wire coat hanger that you’ve straightened out, and shove it on through.

Making a nice-looking mounting plate for the aftermarket switch to fit into the OEM foglight switch plate took longer than the entire rest of the rewiring project.

The switch I used was just the right size to poke through the rectangular opening of the factory piece, but shaping the ABS plastic of the aftermarket switch’s mounting plate to fit took a long time.

Here’s the OEM plate for the HID beam adjuster, with the OEM foglight switch removed (it’s just held in place by a couple of plastic tabs on the side of the switch. The plate can be removed from the dash by gently prying underneath the edge of it):



I did some measuring of the backside of the OEM switchplate with some cheapie plastic Harbor Freight "calipers," then used a finetip Sharpie to mark where I’d have to grind down the ABS plate for the aftermarket switch with the bench grinder:



Due to the complex shape of the back of the OEM plate, the mounting plate for the aftermarket switch needs to fairly tweaky too to fit right. Note that it has to be slightly "off-center" in order for the new switch to be centered in the opening:



The results are pretty good though, if I may say so myself:





I used a little hotglue to secure the plate in place from the back, after flexing it and bending it a bit get it to contour to the OEM piece better:





And here’s the switch in the car, powered down and lit up (the switch lights up when the fog lights are on):





Here’s proof of roughly what the wiring and the relay weighs:



And proof it really works, just in case you don't believe me.

Fog lights on with just parking lights:



Fog lights with low beams (just like factory):



Fog lights with low & high beams:



And finally, one shot of fog lights with parking lights, this time with Nokya "Hyper Yellow" H11 bulbs installed, for that ricy, JDM-biter look:



I think this how-to is pretty clear, but let me know if you have any questions. I hope this is helpful to anyone who wants an alternative method to control the factory fog lights on their Evo IX (I’m assuming the VIII is very similar if not identical, but I don’t know).

Also, for more info on how relays work and how to wire them, this website is very helpful: http://www.the12volt.com/relays/relays.asp

Moderator, if you feel this writeup is worthy, please sticky it in the How Tos/Installations subforum!

Last edited by EGbeater; May 2, 2009 at 10:58 AM. Reason: more information
Old Apr 8, 2009, 11:13 PM
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Worthy!

Nice job, and very well documented. Be sure to update when you figure out how to do it without having to have the parking lights on - that's what I wanna have...
Old Apr 8, 2009, 11:25 PM
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good job.. although,

i would do it an easier way.

no relay required.
battery>fuse>switch+
switch>fuse>bulbs>
then just ground the bulbs like you did, this way you can turn them off/on without even turning on the car. haha getto
Old Apr 9, 2009, 07:02 AM
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Originally Posted by Sr20kidD
good job.. although,

i would do it an easier way.

no relay required.
battery>fuse>switch+
switch>fuse>bulbs>
then just ground the bulbs like you did, this way you can turn them off/on without even turning on the car. haha getto
Well, yes - that would work too. But wiring it up directly like that would also allow you to accidentally leave your fog lights on really easily, which combined with the small Odyssey PC680 battery I have, would result in a dead battery in about half an hour.

I'd much rather have the relay in place to prevent that from happening.

Originally Posted by ixmrgg
Be sure to update when you figure out how to do it without having to have the parking lights on - that's what I wanna have...
All you have to do to have fog lights enabled whenever the ignition circuit is activated is to take the blue wire that I've shown tapped into the 7.5A micro fuse for parking light circuit in the engine bay fuse box, and run it into the car and tap it to the black wire with white stripes under the dash by the steering column instead.

You should put a 5 or 10 amp fuse inline to the black/white wire, right under the dash, in case your power line shorts out along the way to the relay under the hood (on the firewall, for example); that way, the fuse will pop immediately and eliminate any possibility of melting the wire all the way into the engine compartment.

Here's a couple pictures of it (the yellow wire that's tapped into the black/white ignition wire is for my alarm):





Also, here's the fuse box/battery area with the install completed and the wiring loomed - you can see the relay stuffed back between the left side of the fuse box and the battery. There's a tab on the SPDT relay you could use to ziptie to the existing wiring back there, but it stays put just fine without ziptieing it:

Old Apr 9, 2009, 07:13 AM
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Excellent write-up and nice fabrication with the switch.....

The only thing I don't understand is when you need fog lights (when it is foggy) you don't want to have your high beams on as it tends to decrease vision due to reflection off the fog. That is why OEMs wire with the low beams (shooting lower to the ground) vs. high beams (which are aimed higher).

Either way great how to...
Old Apr 9, 2009, 11:21 AM
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Originally Posted by cij911
The only thing I don't understand is when you need fog lights (when it is foggy) you don't want to have your high beams on as it tends to decrease vision due to reflection off the fog. That is why OEMs wire with the low beams (shooting lower to the ground) vs. high beams (which are aimed higher).
Good point cij911. You're right of course. There's three reasons why having total control over your fog lights is nice:

1. I like as much light as I can get when driving at night. Why not make use of the fogs as "driving lights" (as weak as they are) to help illuminate the area right in front of the car?

2. Sometimes I might choose to run my fog lights as much for fashion as for utility.

3. I hate it whenever the car is programmed to take away my ability to make my own choices. For example, the fact that turning the air control dial to "defrost" automatically opens the HVAC system to outside air irritates the hell out of me.

I can make my own decisions about how to best defog my windows, thank-you-very-much. Put features like that in minivans where the driver can barely manage to back up without running something over, NOT in my Evo!
Old Apr 14, 2009, 09:35 PM
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Very good write-up but what do i do with the factory oem foglight switch, i really dont want to replace it with non oem switch.
Old Apr 20, 2009, 12:30 PM
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Originally Posted by EGbeater
Good point cij911. You're right of course. There's three reasons why having total control over your fog lights is nice:

1. I like as much light as I can get when driving at night. Why not make use of the fogs as "driving lights" (as weak as they are) to help illuminate the area right in front of the car?

2. Sometimes I might choose to run my fog lights as much for fashion as for utility.

3. I hate it whenever the car is programmed to take away my ability to make my own choices. For example, the fact that turning the air control dial to "defrost" automatically opens the HVAC system to outside air irritates the hell out of me.

I can make my own decisions about how to best defog my windows, thank-you-very-much. Put features like that in minivans where the driver can barely manage to back up without running something over, NOT in my Evo!

Good write up and I'm totally with you on that!!
Old Apr 22, 2009, 11:15 AM
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This is a very good mod and I wanted to do this long long time ago...Now, with this sourceful post, I have the following questions:

1) Where is that "black" wire (on the aftermarket switch) going to?? Never mentioned on here...
2) Instead of using an aftermarket switch, can we tap that "blue" wire (from the relay) into the "red" line on the OEM fog light switch base? Then we can still use the OEM fog light switch??
3) Since 87A is not being used, can we use SPST instead of the SPDT??
4) Anyone else besides the author has tried this? (Please chime in...)

Thank You for the knowledge!!
Old Apr 30, 2009, 12:28 PM
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Don't mind the questions no more, becoz I've already got it installed and IT IS WORKING FLAWLESSLY (so far...) As for the Q#2, yes, the SPST alone is fine (a bit cheaper too)!!

One of the difference I did from EGBeater is that I have the signal power line fuse-tapped into the cigaratte fuse instead of the parking light. So that I can control the fog light as soon as I have the key on. Another difference is that I didn't touch any of my OEM parts and I have the switch installed just underneith of my steering wheel. So, basically, I'm having the OEM fog light switch/harness available for something...something like the "Evil Eyes" set!!!

Anyways, this is the most reliable and cleanest way to do it. Please make this one "sticky"!!

EGBeater, Thank You for your additional help...
Old May 1, 2009, 05:30 PM
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Great write up, really detailed and lots of pics just like i like my write ups. Only question i do have is when you connected the wires to the bulbs, why not just use the stock clips instead of using the spade connectors?
Old May 2, 2009, 11:00 AM
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Originally Posted by adamgetem
Great write up, really detailed and lots of pics just like i like my write ups. Only question i do have is when you connected the wires to the bulbs, why not just use the stock clips instead of using the spade connectors?
You certainly could, if you wanted to cut off the ends of the OEM fog light wires and splice them into the new wiring... I just prefer not to do that, so I could restore it to 100% OEM if I were to sell the car and the new buyer objected to my aftermarket wiring.
Old May 2, 2009, 04:27 PM
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Thats what i figured, i was just curious to why you chose not to. But once again good job, im gonna probably start this sometime soon, even tho the evo is currently motorless.
Old May 4, 2009, 10:46 AM
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Originally Posted by adamgetem
Thats what i figured, i was just curious to why you chose not to. But once again good job, im gonna probably start this sometime soon, even tho the evo is currently motorless.
"motor less" - That means you got more room to work with...not too bad for that

The other reason I'd keep all the OEM stock stuffs is that I can actually use them for something else if I need to, although that something will be low-beam dependent though...
Old May 4, 2009, 10:47 AM
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Originally Posted by EGbeater
You certainly could, if you wanted to cut off the ends of the OEM fog light wires and splice them into the new wiring... I just prefer not to do that, so I could restore it to 100% OEM if I were to sell the car and the new buyer objected to my aftermarket wiring.
Hey, EGBeater...I'm glad that they've made this posting sticky!!


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