Need fog light hack

[Smokerider]

Is it possible to change the position of the wires for the fog lights at the fuse bus so that the lights can be turned off and on independently of the headlights. I would like to be able to turn them on and off at will. Any thoughts?

[ghamilton]

Check out this thread:

Fog lights without headlights?

[Jack Stands]

Anything is possible. Simply power the fog light switch from a power supply that is on when the car’s running (so you don’t leave them on accidentally when parked). I always thought that they’d make better running light than fog lights.

[Canada Kev]

This is an easy change.

Use this chart for reference:




Remove your headlight switch. If I recall correctly (though this may only apply to later cars like the 3.2...), pry out the little plastic circle in the switch knob and remove the nut - 10mm I think. Pull the knob off and there will be a round piece, with the switch shaft sticking through the middle, that actually holds the switch in place. It should have a couple holes or indentations on the face. Use some small needle nose pliers with the tips placed in those holes to turn that round piece off. The switch should come out easily from the back side of the dash. The back side should look like this with a bunch of wires plugged into those terminal pins.




There should be a larger gauge grey wire probably plugged into pin #56. That will be the headlight switching circuit. Notice on my chart above that the row with pin 56 has a check mark in the column labelled ignition on and with the switch position as 2. That's why your headlights only work with the ignition on and with the switch pulled all the way out.

Now move that grey wire (fog circuit) to another terminal pin that has power when you want the fog lights to be able to work. I changed mine to pin #75 so my fogs would work at any time that the ignition was on regardless of headlight switch position. This way I could use them as daytime running lights when on the highway and they will turn themselves off with the ignition or when I forget.

If you wanted your fogs to work with the running lights on, move the grey wire to terminal pin #58, 58L or 58R. These pins have power with the ignition switch on or off and the headlight switch in the first or second notch. But remember to turn the fogs off with the car because they will stay on whenever the fog switch is on regardless if the car is on or not.

[aldente295]

Sadly this doesn't work for me. No matter what combination I tried, I could never get the foglights to work independently. And oddly, several combos resulted in the HEADLIGHTS staying on all of the time.

What I've ended up doing in the short term is moving the fuse wire for the foglights to a fuse that is always on with the key turned to position 1 or 2. This isn't ideal, as it means you have to start your engine with the foglights on, can't listen to the radio with the engine off without having your fog lights on, etc.

Maybe this is because I have installed the headlight relays? That's the only thing I can think of that's different from 'stock' (whatever stock means with these cars!)

If I get the energy I may try to figure out the wiring on the back of the foglight switch itself, and see if I can wire it to work independently of the headlights. But getting to that switch is crazy awkward.

[Canada Kev]

I have the JWest headlight relay so that's likely not your issue.

And you probably shouldn't be doing different "combos" randomly without knowing what you're doing.

Use a test light to see which pin gets juice and in what situations. Determine which wire is your fogs (likely is a larger grey wire). Plug your fog wire to the pin that gets juice when you want the fogs to work.

[Mark Salvetti]

Try this, here is a scan of the work shop manual section for adding fogs to cars without. The notes in red correspond to what I found on my SC when I rewired so the fogs work with the parking lights. Should work for a 1980 too I would think.

Follow Section 7. The note regarding cars wired to US spec is for fogs that only come on with the headlights.



Mark

[RSBob]

I did this and it involved moving one wire on the fuse block. Dean wrote, “There is a small grey wire that feeds the relay for the fogs. If you connect the grey wire to a ign. switched fuse then you can run the fogs by themselves. I run mine as DRL's. The feed for the fogs is near the front of the fusepanel.”

Don’t bother with the ignition switch, just move the gray wire to a fuse with a red/White switched on power lead.