PIAA 5430 MINI Kit Install
By Jason Bingham (jbing on NAM, MINI2, and WMS)

The following pictures will help with the routing and connections of the wires in the PIAA 5430 MINI Driving Light Kit. Use this How-To in combination with the instructions supplied with the PIAA Kit.

The PIAA instructions have all of the bit sizes.

Here is a close-up of the wiring and metal brackets crossing through the grille of the MCS. You can also see two of the three mounting locations for the bolts, washers, and nuts. One bolt on each side of the bracket.



Here is a view looking up under the bonnet at one of the mounting brackets. I STRONGLY recommend using tape, wrapped sticky side out, around your finger for placing the nut on the single bolt on the bracket which goes between the two heat dissipation holes in the hood. You will need to do it totally by feel and if you drop the nut don’t count on getting it back. I use a small amount of 3M spray adhesive on the tip of my finger to keep the nut from falling off.

(!!!THIS PART TAKES A LOT OF PATIENCE, SO PLEASE TAKE YOUR TIME!!!)



This picture shows both brackets in place and you can also so the wires being routed into the hood. The location of my lights is centered in the middle of my bonnet stripes and VERY close to the measurement dictated in the official MINI installation guide; 192.5mm. The measurement is taken from the center line of the hood to the inside edge of the mounting bracket.



Here I am pointing at the main PIAA wiring harness that I routed under the black heat shield, you can also see it in the above picture. I had to remove three of the plastic scrivet screws to get all of the harness routed underneath. It is not very difficult just be careful not to ruin the scrivet screws when you remove them. Go ahead and plug both of the lamps into the two sockets on the PIAA wiring harness.



Here is a close-up of the PIAA corrugated wire harness exiting from underneath the heat shield right next to the drivers side headlight.



Here is a wide angle shot of the area the wiring harness exits the heat shield and you can also see it routed down the tube that supplies liquid to the xenon headlamp washer, next to the pneumatic bonnet supports. The PIAA kit comes with some zip ties and if you need more any local hardware store will have them.



Here is a close-up of the underside of the headlamp, if you have the standard headlamps instead of the xenon’s it will look a little different. The PIAA wiring harness has a white power lead that needs to be attached to the high-beam wire with the supplied plastic wire tap. The high-beam wire is the yellow/green one which can possibly be seen in the picture, it is very obvious looking at the four wires which one it is. I am pointing at the location the plastic wire tap is located. I made sure to very securely attach it to the harness with lots of electrical tape and zip ties, you can see the white wire exiting the electrical tape section. At approximately the location of the zip tie near my thumb the white wire is routed into the corrugated PIAA harness so it will be protected from getting pinched under the bonnet.



The next picture shows the location where I stopped using zip ties to secure the PIAA harness to the liquid supply line for the headlamps. I used one remaining zip tie to tie the PIAA harness to the grounding strap which comes down from the hood. I did this so the harness would bend out of the way of the hood with the grounding strap and be safe from pinching.



Here you can see the corrugated wiring harness entering the engine bay and going underneath the cowl. You can see two white connectors, to the left of them are two sets of wires with electrical tape around them. Inside each of these I have shortened the overall length of the wires by about two and a half feet and connected by blade style wire connectors.



Here you can see the wires being routed over the steering column area under the cowl looking down through the open cowl vent.



Here you can see where I have stored excess wire next to the area where the main electrical grommet passage is under the cowl. The large red wire goes through this grommet, this is where the switch wire needs to go through to the inside of the car.



Here you can see where I have placed the relay and fuse holder on the screw holding my Alta CAI heat shield, also located in this area is the ground wire and the positive wire lead. You can just see the ground wire at the extreme left of the picture.



Here I have routed the positive wire lead up into the positive battery terminal and secured it under the nut.



And the grounding wire attached to the overflow tank support bracket.



Here is an overall shot of the area the PIAA wiring harness is located. I have removed the cowl vent cover for reference. You can see the Alta CAI foam filter with the PIAA white and black wires going out to the ground and positive wire attachment points.



I swapped out my PIAA factory switch for this red toggle switch from radio shack. I like it better for placing in my parcel shelf blanking plate. You can see it on the left side of the steering wheel. I have seen the factory switch placed under the steering column with the stock American MCS knee bolster. The factory switch has a double sided foam tape to hold it in place.



With all of that you are finished, hope you like your lights like I do. Light Up The Night!!!

 

Moderator, this would be a great sticky :D

 

Great write-up! I can't wait to get my kit!

 

I modified my kit a small bit. I used 3 self tapping screws to hold the brackets in because I have no faith in my abilities to fish a nut in that area. With my luck I would drive the next 30,000 miles hearing the slight jingling of 6 tiny nuts rattling in my hood

 

Nice job!
I have a similar set up (CAI, parcel shelf...)
I have the kit still on the shelf at work.
My friend has the fact. installed lights and they used black rivets to mount the brackets.
They are suposed to be better for high vibration apps.
I used em on my pickup truck to hold the grill on. that was 10+ years ago, it's still there.
Looking at your parcel shelf.
Is that a lighter socket on the right side of the stearing column?
Good idea!
Joel

 

Yes that is a Power Outlet that I added to my Parcel Shelf. I used and Add-A-Circuit to get the power and grounded it to the stock cigarette lighter. Eventually I started to get lots of feedback so I disconnected it. I will need to run a ground into the engine compartment and ground it in there, probably on one of the strut tower nuts or where I grounded my PIAA's. I can not find any adaquate grounding spots under my '04 dash.

 

Sticky, excellent piece on the lamp install! Thanks for taking the time, it's appreciated!

 

Am I correct in assuming they only work with the high beams?

 

PIAA 520 SMRs on beefy Mini-Madness mounts.

 

I'm getting ready to install the factory driving lights on my 04 MCS. Looks like you have answered many of my ?'s before I could think to ask them. Great information, nicely presented. Many thanks!.......................mgg

 

I went out today to do my pre-installation examination of my hood. I have a PIAA 520 kit, but not a Mini Kit - I also have the Mini-Madness mounts.


Now on the PIAA mounts or Mini mounts, the bottom holes go BELOW the metal framework, and the mounting bracket sticks out above it through the grill. On my mini Madness mounts, there is just one bend, and the mounting holes are ABOVE the last grill bar. There is no room to drill down into this piece. How do you get the holes to line up correctly and drill them from below? The wiring part seems pretty straightforward, but I do not want unsightly bolt ends or rivet ends anywhere near the outside surfaces, so I bought Stainless steel Allen head screws and Stainless Steel locking nuts. All outside viewable fasteners will be SS Allen heads. But there is the pesky problem of hole alignment and drilling.


UPDATE: You will notice that the above sticky post does not show the finished installation from the front of the car. This is because the PIAA 540's are UUUGGGLLLYYYY. And thats without the hideous grille guards! I went with the retro look of real Wipac's as fitted to the original Mini.

 

A bit off topic but are the back of those lights black or chrome? If black do you have any pics of them?

 

there chrome, doubt they come black. I'd have to paint them black.

 

They look black here:

http://www.piaa.com/Lamps/Lamps-VS01.html

and here:

http://www.thepartsbin.com/sitemap/p...hts~parts.html

I guess a little research pays off

 

This link: http://minicooperclubofwny.com/forum...opic.php?t=137 will take you to Pamlico's install of the 540 kit, complete with pictures of the final installation. IMO, the PIAAs look and work much better than the Wipacs. However, if I were to do the installation again, I would go with a custom installation using Cibies.

 

I purchased and mounted my PIAA 5430 Driving Light kit about a month and a half ago and the casing of the lights were black. This is only a guess but you may be refering to the removable black plastic grills (only a guess due to the links you posted). Attached are pics of my driving lights. I hope this helps.

By the way, Thanks to jbing for posting the "how to" it was very helpful.

golden_child

 

Good write up and install info, really came in handy. My only concern is that the grounding spot you recommended I TRIED even though I was a little sketchy on it because all it is is a screw going through some plastic. SO, I tried that ground spot and I barely got enough power to light the little LED on the toggle switch. I moved my ground to a nut on the strut tower and all works great now

 

Wow, what a great job jbing!

Really great pics. I had my PIAA lights installed by a local garage. They are fitted on great, and look great.

However, the wiring is not quite right as I can only switch them on and off separately to the headlights.

When I had the MINI factory driving lights on my old MC, if I turned the switch for the lights on, they came on with my high beams, and of course went off when I dimmed my headlights. This is the ideal way to have them working.

The way I have them now is not good because if I meet a car coming in the other direction and want to dim everything in a hurry, I have 2 things to do.

Do you think that there will be a simple solution to get this right???

 

Sounds to me like they didn't tap into the highbeam wire. Here is what I posted in the How-To above:

"The PIAA wiring harness has a white power lead that needs to be attached to the high-beam wire with the supplied plastic wire tap. The high-beam wire is the yellow/green one which can possibly be seen in the picture, it is very obvious looking at the four wires which one it is. I am pointing at the location the plastic wire tap is located. I made sure to very securely attach it to the harness with lots of electrical tape and zip ties, you can see the white wire exiting the electrical tape section."

You will need to find your white power wire and connect it to the yellow/green high beam wire. You can look at the How-To to see where I placed the other wires. Some people have found that their ground didn't work so well on the place I put it so it can also be placed under one of the three top nuts on the drivers side front shock tower.

Hope this helps out.

L8r,

Jason

 

Ive got mine so they turn on seperately like yours, AND so that they come on with the high beams.... no "arming" needed. I like this setup alot.

 

I have attached to the yellow/green wire and my driving lights stay on all the time too. They only go out if I turn my zenons off. I am positive I have the right wires connected. Works ok for me though..

 

I have run into the same problem. I tapped into the yellow/green wire and the driving lights are controlled by the low beams (xenons). I was a little suspicious at first because the yellow/green wire is much thicker than the others and I thought it might be the xenon lead. Has anyone figured out which wire is the high beam lead.?

 

I cannot find the lead to the high beams to operate my Piaas. I currently have it hooked up to the yellow/green wire but that is hot when the xenons are on. I ran a voltmeter to the remaining six wires and all of them are hot (except the brown which I assume is the ground) when the xenons are on. I wonder if this has something to do with having automatic headlights. Any help would be appreciated.

 

When I was installing my PIAA kit, I lost one of the screws. Any idea where I can find one of these SS rares?

 

I just installed a pair of Hella 500's and they look great. They are bigger than the PIAA's but have similar output. I hooked up mine so that they work independantly of any lights. This way they can be used at any time, even w/o the keys in. If I can get some help on loading pics I can show the brackets and installation sequence. NAPA sells these lights for under $100 a pair. You don't have to spend gobs of money to LIGHT the Night!! C-Ya