rear fog lights??

ascal

hi all,

just wondering should both rear fog lights be working on bmw 316? only one seems to be wired in however there are two bulbs?? nct coming up soon so want to get it sorted!

cheers

Atlantic Dawn

Only 1 should be working.

Also fog lights are not currently tested on the NCT.

T-Maxx

Don't mind the foglights, check that your car is indeed fitted with (working)indicators, since most BMW's aren't...:pac:

Hagar

Oh goody, a fog light thread, I love these.

JoeySully

is it an e36? do you have clear indicators?

neilthefunkeone

my e36 only has one..

And working indicator's.. Imagine that..:rolleyes:

JoeySully

neilthefunkeone wrote: »

my e36 only has one..

And working indicator's.. Imagine that..:rolleyes:

I thought the E36 had 2. At least I think mine did till I changed to the OEM rear lights with clear indicators.

neilthefunkeone

JoeySully wrote: »

I thought the E36 had 2. At least I think mine did till I changed to the OEM rear lights with clear indicators.

Yeah i have the oem clear rear's.. Its an Mtech so factory fitted.. Must have a goo later.. pretty sure there was a blank on the left light...:o

JoeySully

I had to do some rewiring to the back of my lights to get the brake lights working as the wiring is different for the white indicator rear lights. I.e they are for cars with the "bulb blown warning" system which mine doesn't have. I stopped when i had one rear fog light though. one is enough for me. I do have 2 fog light bulbs though.

colm_mcm

JoeySully wrote: »

I do have 2 fog light bulbs though.

Hope you use them wherever possible!

GTE

There are complaints about fog light threads but in this one its being derailed by the people who are complaining even though there was no hint of it turning into one of the more extreme fog threads.

Anyway,
I drive a Golf estate from 2000 and I have seen them with just the one light on but my one has two working bulbs so I guess the previous owner put another bulb in.
I was told it doesnt matter so I wouldnt worry about it. If anything the general norm is for just the one rear fog.

colm_mcm

a lot of cars have the fog light on the drivers side and the reverse light on the passenger side.
The Golf estate has 2 reverse lights, so I'd assume it has 2 fog lights too.

Alanstrainor

Lads this isn't a "fog light" thread as such. It's a very straight forward question, now let's keep it on topic please.
Cheers,

Hagar

If you have a pair of fog lights you can get them to function as auxilliary brakes lights (may be technically illegal for on road use) with a bit of imagination and a pair of standard relays.

cadaliac

69 wrote: »

If you have a pair of fog lights you can get them to function as auxilliary brakes lights (may be technically illegal for on road use) with a bit of imagination and a pair of standard relays.

NO, it will blind people behind. One will be enough.
You could get it to work of course but why would you bother? As Colm said, the fog light should be on the drivers side, for two lane traffic, so you can identify that there is a car in front in foggy weather.
Twice the brightness of your fog lights would surely blind the traffic behind you, espically when they start to group up in traffic.

Hagar

Fog lights and brakes lights are both 21w aren't they? Many are low down in the bumper.
It was only a theoretical suggestion not an imperative.

GTE

69 wrote: »

Fog lights and brakes lights are both 21w aren't they? Many are low down in the bumper.
It was only a theoretical suggestion not an imperative.

http://pics.tdiclub.com/data/500/rear_fog_r2.pdf

Thats for wiring rear fogs into a VAG as well as the 5 light mod.

In the USA I think the VAG cars dont come with any sort of rear fog installed so they have to get a euro switch (or maybe its what they call it over there) and wire it in themselves.

Anyway, the thing about the 5 brake mod is that (Id say especially over here) is that the fog light enclosure is designed to project the light more effectively, so with the 21w bulb you get more light (more focused anyway) then you do with the normal brakes.

But it indeed can be done if you get a lower wattage bulb maybe or if you stick a resistor or something to lower the voltage coming into the bulb when you brake. That way you can still have full power when you switch the fogs on.

Andrew33

colm_mcm wrote: »

a lot of cars have the fog light on the drivers side and the reverse light on the passenger side.
The Golf estate has 2 reverse lights, so I'd assume it has 2 fog lights too.

Cars(most) are wired for two rear fogs but in most cases they just set them up to work the one on the drivers side, for our market its the r/h one, for the continent its the l/h one, this is not a hard and fast rule as some makers just wire the two of them to work (which seems easier but VW group cars seem to only light the relevant side).

_Kaiser_

My old Passat (and my current one) both have a single rear fog light on the drivers side.

What I really miss though is the 2 reversing lights that the older Passat had, but which they reduced to one on the new model.
Major pain when trying to reverse at night as one just doesn't throw out enough light to see by. :mad:

I suppose I COULD get another rear light cluster from a LHD car (So that the fog light lens on the right would instead be clear rather than red) and wire it so both worked as reverse lights, but then I'd have no rear fog

Oh well...

GTE

Kaiser2000 wrote: »

My old Passat (and my current one) both have a single rear fog light on the drivers side.

I have a feeling that if you looked in the lighting cluster that you could stick a second bulb in there.

Thats a good point that I didnt think of about the single reversing light.
Interesting.

Pique

The E36 only has one working(wired) rear fog light as standard. However you can run a piece of wire across to the lhs one to make both work. s'easy.

DrivingsCool

Atlantic Dawn wrote: »

Only 1 should be working.

Also fog lights are not currently tested on the NCT.

I cant believe this!!! Explains, the amount of drivers that dont use their fog lights in dence fog! They dont as theyre broke!

Heroditas

Maybe they're not fog lights, but spot lights.

_Kaiser_

bbk wrote: »

Thats a good point that I didnt think of about the single reversing light.
Interesting.

Yep it's very annoying, not to mention dangerous as the B6 Passat is hard enough to reverse sometimes anyway.
Don't know why they changed it to be honest.. a better idea would have been to move the fog light(s) to the outer circle (looks like it's wired with LEDs but isn't) and just have a standard white bulb/clear lens as on the other side, see below:

whiterebel

DrivingsCool wrote: »

I cant believe this!!! Explains, the amount of drivers that dont use their fog lights in dence fog! They dont as theyre broke!

No, they are probably keeping them for when they really need them, i.e. bright sunny weather, dusk.......

GTE

whiterebel wrote: »

No, they are probably keeping them for when they really need them, i.e. bright sunny weather, dusk.......

Whisht. Rails are meant to stay on, not jump off when you can stick a joke in.

GTE

Kaiser2000 wrote: »

Yep it's very annoying, not to mention dangerous as the B6 Passat is hard enough to reverse sometimes anyway.
Don't know why they changed it to be honest.. a better idea would have been to move the fog light(s) to the outer circle (looks like it's wired with LEDs but isn't) and just have a standard white bulb/clear lens as on the other side, see below:

Or even, if you take the second photo that has the fog light, if the bulb was placed in the bottom left corner of the unit then with the reverse lights in the middle.

Ahhh. Its silly stuff. Hopefully the newer models will be better.