My last Mini was an 06 S at least 10 years ago so I'm a little rusty and appreciate any help. I have a 2003 S that I have issues with... long story short it wasn't in nearly as good of shape as I was led to believe (was purchased sight unseen). I've been working on fixing it up, and not too long ago picked up a wrecked 04 S as a parts car. I would love to just swap what I need off the 03 to the 04, but it was flipped and I would have to cut the roof off, etc... and I don't want to get that involved. So my question becomes: The 04 has Xenon headlights, and fog lights which I would like on my 03. I know there are issues swapping the BCM, but since I have an entire car for parts would I be able to get around that by swapping the ECU as well? The 03 randomly loses power to the fuel pump, so I've already pulled the fuse block out of the 04 to try getting that working correctly, and I have a seat airbag issue to track down which I think is wiring. Thanks in advance for any insight.

 

Subscribed for learning and interest in seeing how this pans out but thinking a BCM and ECU swap are mightily problematic just to enable those two features. One other note but right off the bat you'll also need the leveling sensor on the left (driver in North America) control arm; not sure if you'll find a connector for it dangling somewhere nearby on your '03 just waiting for the upgrade or not. If it isn't, it could be an additional issue.

As for the part time fuel pump issue what about swapping in a new relay - before the fuse panel and/or pump. The nice thing about pre-facelift cars (pre-9/2005 production to be exact) is that the relay is a quick plug and play replacement vs the later design where they incorporated it into the back of the fuse panel, because BMW.





Good luck with this project and welcome back (best condolences?) to MINI ownership.

 

Yeah,I wouldn’t bother swapping bc1 for that, just code xenons and set height manually, though as I understand you might already have the plug for sensor in the harness.


you would need to cannibalize the fog harness from bcm out though. And if the 04 has the switch steal the panel so you don’t have to buy one.

 

The last time it died on me (while I was driving of course) I swapped the relay with the one above it with no change, so that's why I'm swapping the whole fuse block to try that... I have been debating wiring in a switch and bypassing the whole fuse panel with it just in case. I was having issues with it when I first got it, put in a new pump and filter and it ran great for about 8 months, now I'm having issues again. Wouldn't start 3 days in a row a few weeks back, and then started fine the next 2.

 

The 04 does have the switch so I can pull that out. My 03 has the Mini driving lights, but the lights themselves are junk and the relay is bad, I looked into a new relay and it was $70 so that hasn't happened. I haven't looked under the 03 yet to see if I have the plug for the level sensor, it will go on the lift later this week though.

 

Just for clarity, aux lights amd fog lights are two different things.

fogs are in the lower bumper amd controlled by a switch on th3 toggle bank thru the bc1.


aux lights are standalone and have their own self resetting switch and relay and are mounted on the grill.


edit after re-reading, think we are on the same page.

if you get the mounts off the 04 hood, the Hellas I have on the Route 66 pepper white are quite good, less expensive than the mini aux lights at around $100, and fit them well size wise. I managed to salvage the overcomplex relay and dash wiring but had to rewire the underhood. Area totally on mine

see link in sig


if installing from scratch with non stock wiring, you could tap off the hi beam feed out to your in cabin switch 12+ input, so it would only work when hi beams on and be overridden to off… and from switch to standard relay input underhood, and take relay power like factory did off the stud on back side of underhood fuse box etc etc.


if I hadn’t been able to salvage the hacked aux light wiring on mine, that’s how I would have redone it.

 

So just a small update, my fuel pump issue turned out to be a loose ground at the nut. Not sure why it worked most of the time when it was warm and didn't when it was colder... maybe just expanded and contracted enough to lose connection.
Hoping the get to swapping the headlights next week, and then tackle the fog light swap.

 

Thanks for the update. Can you point to the location of the ground for future readers please?

 

For current readers too!

I'm experiencing an issue when the car doesn't start immediately when it's been sitting for more than a few years, and really struggle when it's cold, and while the list of potential suspects is endless (I'm working through it), a loose ground nut is easy enough to do a quick check for, if only I know where to look.