Ok, I have been trying to get my high beams linked to my rally lights so that when I turn on my high beams my rally lights come on outomatically. I have tried jumping wires and other crap, but now I am tempted to link them right to the high beam hot wire. Does anyone know what wire that is with the Xenons with the washers?

 

I believe it's the yellow with green tracer coming off the plug on the lights.

 

This is probably what I'm gonna do (don't want an extra switch). Is there any potential problems?

 

Do you really want to activating the driving lights EVERY time you use your High Beams? If I recall the operation of my dealer-installed driving lights, you only have to press the button once to activate the driving lights when you switch on the high beams. They stay in this mode until you turn off the ignition. THey come on every time you hit the highs unless you press the driving light switch to de-activate this fuinction.
Charlie

 

Charlie, yes I do, I live in the boonies and when I want high beams I want MASSIVE ILLUMINATION without pressing more buttons or switches. The fact that they want to make the switch a SMALL button on the left side of the wheel is even worse. I think Mini ought to reconcider putting this switch in place of the rear fog lamp switch in the toggles. Even so I would want mine on every time I used my high beams.

 

Yes, yes... driving lights every time with high beams. That's how mine are and I really like it. Lights up the night big time.

God speed.

 

The driving lights don't have to come on EVERY time you hit the high beams. Just rig them up so that the only time they will come on is when the high beam circuit is hot, but leave them switched. When you switch them on, they will come on with the high beams only - when they are turned off, they won't come on at all. That's how I've got mine set up and how I've done it on several other cars.

 

I have the European version of the rally lights that are wired directly into the high beams, They come on whenever the brights are turned on and there is no stand bye switch. It's the way I like it personally.

 

It would be unwise to wire the rally lights directly to the high beams without at least some sort of relay and alternate power source for the rally lights. You would be adding another 10 amps (or more, depending on the lights) of current draw to the high beam circuitry, and this can exceed it's capacity. Overfusing is not wise, since the MINI uses a transistor instead of a conventional relay to pass the current to the lights (this transistor is switched on and off rapidly when you have daytime running lights to 'dim' the highbeams). This transistor is part of the body control module, and could be damaged by overcurrent. Repairing this would be expensive.

Also, keep that in mind if you have, or would ever want daytime running lights activated. You will be blasting everyone with the rally lights any time the DRLs are active.

_________________
"Earl Grey" - '03 MCS, DS over DS, 17" R85s, NAV, DSC (often turned off!), Packs #1 and #3, Rally lights, etc, etc. Perf Mods by the boatload, on the way! Fulton, MD. FRS 7-21

Let's Get Small!

 

Good advice here - it is better to wire a relay in place and have the relay fire only when the wire to the high beams is live... let the relay pull from the battery. Check out a basic driving light wiring diagram and you'll get the idea. If you are interested in Hella lights, (we like their quality) we do offer very good prices on them, with wiring kits and diagrams.

Regards,
KC

Rally Performance /
Cool New Mini
http://www.coolnew.com

 

I'll second GreatBear's advice.

This is especially true if you are out in the middle of nowhere and run the hi-beams and driving lights for extended times. I'd have to see the actual wire sizes and run some calculations to be sure, but given normal manufacturing practices (only as big as it has to be) I'd guess the hi-beam wiring is sized for the hi-beams ONLY. Adding additional load to the wiring could overload the system.

DO NOT, I REPEAT ; DO NOT replace the fuse with a higher value if you have tripping issues. Doing so will transfer the overload to the wiring, which during extended use could make it overheat, melt, and possibly cause a fire = burnt Mini - not good. Find out what is causing the tripping and properly fix it (this really applies to any blown fuse/tripped breaker problem; car, home or otherwise).

I design this kind of stuff for living and although I work with higher voltages (120 and above), the design principles are the same.

 

What the heck is wrong with switches?!
I love switches. I want more of them. I want so many that people have to ask me what each one does. That's one thing that, for me, added to the mystique of the Aston Martin DB-5 in Goldfinger. Buttons and switches, baby!

I've got my rally lights connected to the switch in the Euro parcel tray, just as the doctor ordered. Now, if I could just figure out how to make an ejector seat, or turn my MINI into a submarine...

 

I think I misead everyone when I said that I wired the rally lights directly into my highbeams.

The european aux driving light kit (which is much cheaper than the US version by the way) comes with a wiring harness, fuses, et al. It is plugged into the control module of the car (right lower passenger footwell) although I forget which slot. What I should of said is that each/every time I turn my highbeams on my rally lights come on too. If you are crafty there is a way to add a kill switch to turn off the rally lights when your high beams come on (although this version does not come standard this way).

Hope that clears things up!

 

From what I am now understanding, there´s an American driving light kit and a european driving light kit. The American spec has the switch and the Euro spec goes with the high beams (though with its own harness and fuse)

I dont think it would be "legal" to have the driving lights connected to your high beams because in theory you can only have four headlights on, and with the driving lights you would have 6 lamps on (driving, high, and rally)

I was also told at the dealer that the computers of Euro-spec MINIs are not set up to accept the switch with the driving lights, so the opposite could be true for American MINIs (didn´t verify this and at first I though the dealer was kidding me, but it seems to make sense)

 

Driving Hamster....ah, the problem becomes clear now. I've got the same wiring and have added a switch in line like you want to do. Here's how.....
I opened the harness up just after it came in the car from the firewall. Locate the main power line. Cut it and add on enough wire to both ends to reach where you're going to locate your switch. I used the provided spot on the parcel shelf. If you don't have this, you'll have to cut into the knee bolster or figure out somewhere else to mount the switch.
The other option would be to do the same surgery on the wire from the BC1 to the relay. Either way is kind of a pain to do if the light wiring has already been installed.
I also used a lighted switch to let me know when I had power going to my lights. I use light covers most of the time if I'm in town and didn't want to take the chance of accidentally melting them.

 

the euro kit has its own power supply off battery, fuse, activating relay which is mounted by the control unit. the high beams trip the relay, but the BCU must be programmed.

 

>>The european aux driving light kit (which is much cheaper than the US version by the way) comes with a wiring harness, fuses, et al. It is plugged into the control

do you have a part number for this kit? did your dealer install it for you?

thanks

 

Early_apex,

I bought the kit from MiniSpares.com (The UK counterpart to miniparts.com). Here is the part number that I have for the retro fit kit No. 63 12 137 301. I installed it myself (there is a link to a set of pdf directions on this site, do a search for something like European rally lights). It was not to hard to do. A lot easier than the US version (no need to take the center consoul apart). Thus the US version of the instructions will be useless to you.

Took me about 4 -5 hours for the install.

I will see if I can find that link for you.

 

>>I will see if I can find that link for you.

Here is the link I spoke of
Rally Lights - Euro Version Install Instructions .

I did a search for MiniSpares.com and came up with some useful threads including
this one in particular to help you answer some additional questions you might have.

Enjoy!

 

Well Pat here at Ferman was saying that he was going to add in a relay that will make them come on only with high beams like I want by making it trick the relay to think that the button to turn them on has been pushed. I will post the results here when this has been done.

 

I just purchased the Hella F200 driving lights along with a special mounting bracket for the Mini. I am now in the process of installing them.

I am wondering if anyone has some snapshots of how they routed the wires (from the lights in the bonnet, to the power source, and through the firewall to the the cockpit). Any comments and ideas will be very welcome.

 

I have to agree with the Kurtster I also have mine wired just along side the parcel tray... only turn them on occassionally, when I need them, but love the switches. Also installed the rear fogs to fill up the switch bank.

 

That legality is addressed in the MINI light configuration. I assume that the highs and the normal lights are counted as one by being in that whole all in one assembly.

Anyways I got PIAA lights now (they look tough) and I was wondering if I could get some help with getting them installed to come on with the high beams.

So that I do not have to fish through all the junk I started a thread here: https://www.northamericanmotoring.co...ad.php?t=29568