Had to replace some cheap LED bulbs with standard bulbs to get rid of a bulb out error. While I was there I noticed there was some jumped wiring in the tail light area.

Looks to run from a pretty sizable wiring harness to a small run that goes into the rear right wheelwell/bumper area.

Anyone know why this would be here? Everything seems to function properly. All light turn on and off when they're supposed to.

 

Definitely aftermarket for something. My guess is maybe the car at one point had LED fender lights that had to be t-tapped for operation. Do you have any aftermarket lights on the car anywhere?

 

I think in some year ranges, if you put the VLAND style aftermarket taillights in, you might have to run a wire to the reverse light so that you have backup lights, or additional backup lights. Maybe something along those lines? Trailer hitch wiring?

 

There are no aftermarket lights currently on the car. There were LED bulbs in some of the housings but I don't think that would need wire jumping.
There is also no additional lights that I can tell.
I'll have to poke around more and see if I can find out why exactly whose wires do.

 

Any chance they are run to a resistor (in an attempt to fool the car into thinking the LED tail lights were drawing enough current)?

 

I don't see any resistors in the wiring. Looks like they just jumped two sets of wires together.

This modification is only on the right side as well. Would expect both sides to have it if I was some sort of LED related trickery.

 

Here is my theory...

From your other thread, you have a 2010 Cooper hatchback, which would make it an R56. That vintage, the brake light and running light in the rear ran off the same wiring, and the FRM sent alternate voltage to the bulb for running light vs brake light. This is how Mini was able to get different intensity from the bulb for running light and brake light without having to use a bulb with two filaments.

My guess is by switching to an LED bulb, the previous owner had to run additional wiring to get the running lights to work correctly.

Just a theory...

Have you followed those wires in both directions to see where they go?

 

Without more info, I'd say that that's tapped wires for a trailer wiring harness. Any sign of a hitch back there?

 

I don't see any signs of a hitch ever being on the car.

One side of the jumped wiring is going to the rear right fender marker light. The other is in a large bundle of harness. I cannot tell what it goes too exactly.

Are there wiring diagrams available for the R56 online somewhere?

 

It looks like a blue wire and a brown wire were spliced into. Is this correct? If so, the right rear and left front side marker lights have a blue wire and a brown wire.

 

Yes it is indeed hooked to the rear right marker light. So it's either pulling power from to putting power to that light. I'm not sure which way. I can unplug and find out.

I'm not sure where it going to on the other side of the jumper though.

 

I like this^ idea. Marker lights can be problematic and are susceptible to melting due to poor connections.