cmon greatbear, i know you want to come in here and help!

 

any idea why just the brake lights wouldnt work while i still have turn signals, head lights, and running lights if the BC1 has a problem? wouldnt everything stop working?

 

Maybe those big old Hellas are sucking up all the electrons!

Are you sure you wire the Hellas correctly and did NOT touch any of the wires associated with the computer?

 

the ony wire from the hellas that touch factory parts is the single trigger wire from the driver side high beam to the relay. everything else is independent of the factory harness.

 

i'm not sure if i should have it towed via MINI roadside to Classic MINI or just wait and see if my disconnecting the battery again resets something....i'll wait an hour from now to see if the battery dissconect does anything...

 

The official driving lights have a wire run down to the BC1 to pick up the high beam signal. Did you do that with your install? If so, maybe you dislodged some of the connectors down there and the brake signal to the bulbs is now loose or unplugged.


I wonder if the "flashing" you describe at key on is "normal" ... maybe you just never noticed it before.
It is possible that the BC1 does some start-up tests that result in a small current to the lights for a short time. A normal bulb would not light with such a pulse, but the low current LEDs can easily light up with a very short pulse.


Other than that it is likely you accidentally spliced a driving light wire into the brake circuits instead of the correct place. Again, I don't know if you have put in the official lights or some aftermarket kit ... I know you said you disconnected the driving lights, but did you completely disconnect all the new wiring, or did you only take out a fuse or bulb or whatever?

 

I will go cut open my electrical tape and completely dissconnect the tap from the high beam on the ehadlight and try one more time, i hope is as simple as that and i didnt notice.....

 

ok, cut the one wire from the high beam to the relay, no luck, still no brake lights.

i disconnected the battery again to see fi that will perhaps change something now that the wires from the driving lights are disconnected now.....

 

wait, you said your disconnected the Factory driving lights???

How does the computer know it doesn't have those lights anymore?

From what I understand, the silly computer runs everything, for example, if you add factory fogs, you need to "flash them" whatever that means (I think maybe get the computer to see them)

By disconnecting the factory driving lights, who knows what you screwed up with the comp.

Try "reconnecting" the factory lights, even if temporary to see what happens????

 

The driving lights are one of the things the BC1 has no knowledge of.

 

they arent factory lights, they are hooked to the high beam on the driver side. theres a jumper wire that runs from the driver side high beam to the relay to trigger the lights.

 

So ...
You installed aftermarket lights.
You had a wire to pick up 12V, fused, to go to a relay(?) which then goes to the two lights - they in turn are then grounded.
You have another wire to the relay, which comes from one of the high beam feeds, so the lights are turned on/off with high beams.

Is that it?

You probably picked up the 12V for the lights at the battery in the engine bay (or at the dummy stud on MCS)?
You picked up the high beam wire near one of the headlights?

So you never went near the BC1. You never went near the tail lights. What about the fuse box - you mentioned changing a fuse there?


Is it possible your brake lights have been bad for a while and you only now noticed? Maybe it all is nothing to do with the driving lights.

 

it was in for a tranny swap at classic a week or so ago, i didnt even think of having to check my brake lights to make sure they worked. its very possible they could have been out since then.

i havent done much night driving since then, so i wouldnt have noticed.

 

yes and your description of the install above is exactly what i did

 

Are the original bulbs back in? If not, suggest replacing them. I wonder if you then don't see that strange key-on-flashing you described?

My guess is that the brake lights were bad before you started the driving lights. You just weren't working anywhere that could mess them up.

A tranny swap is much more likely to have been the cause!

I think a dealership visit might be in order. Spin the story such that you believe that the brake lights were failed when they did the tranny ...

 

Have you actually tried starting the car while doing all this testing? Just a thought. Battery may be getting a little low.

Steve

 

ok, no flickering with stock bulbs. I'm going to need to run the LED bulbs till i get to the dealer since my stock bulbs were clear and i now have aero tails on it. i'm hoping if i drive it in, they woulkd look at it right away, since i dont have tail lights and all.

 

yeah, i thought thatg might ne it too, didnt change anything besides make me a bit dizzy in my closed garage.

 

Good luck.

"a series of unfortunate events" ... only noticed problem after doing driving lights, then noticed flickering which is apparently always there but only visible with LEDs ... hopefully all this will wind down to a "simple" fault that the dealership can fix and cover the cost of.

 

they better, the bastards didnt give me back my positive terminal cover and messed up putting a STOCK airbox back in after a tranny install, i dont see why they couldnt mess up the brake lights while they were at it!!!

 

oh yeah, and thanks for all the help guys, i'll keep you updated!v

 

To me, it sounds like your BC1 is wacked. Since the brake light switch is not a switch in the normal sense (it's actually magnetic and has two 'stages' in a failsafe arrangement since it is also used to trigger off the cruise control, a failure of this can light the MIL on the dash) there is no brake light current flowing through it. It simply tells the BC1 that you have pressed the pedal, and the BC1 turns on the lights via three separate yet simultaneous output circuits. If the lights are not coming on, or are doing so in odd patterns or intermittently and the fuse is good, then it's the BC1 acting up.

The BC1 is quite forgiving as far as overloads and such being thrown on it's outputs due to failures and such. The fuses are placed between the main supply (battery voltage) and the output control circuitry (drivers) in the BC1 of a particular subsystem (the brake lights in this case) If the brake light circuit were somehow overloaded, the fuse will blow, protecting the lights, the wiring, the drivers and the rest of the BC1. If the failure resides in the BC1 itself, you will have one missing light if it's the driver circuit, or all three out if it's deeper in the actual microprocessor or bowels of the module. In the case of the brake light circuit, one fuse feeds three drivers and three lights. In your case, it seems it's the power feeding into the system having the problem)

Now, some people haave had issues of water getting on the BC1 module from leaky sunroofs or ill-fitted replacement windshields. The problems start with the cable connectors themselves corroding from the water running down the wiring and sitting inside the connector cavities (this is not just a problem confined to MINIs). Other times it's just that the BC1 is acting up from some form of defect. Either way, this is a warranty issue (unless your car has too many miles on it, where in my opinion it's still a manufacturing defect that has been festering over time).

If you are up to it, removing the kick panel and inspecting the four big connectors on the BC1 module can't hurt, and might or might not uncover the problem.

 

Sure took a while for you to get here, Greabear!

 

I'm not around here anywhere near like I used to be, though I try try try. I tend to miss some posts too. Be patient with me, I'll find my way in.

 

Well, the car is at Classic till monday before they can tell me anything.

This is starting to get rediculous. The cant tell me exactly what is causing the problems here. Its tripping a few codes ( i think i saw headlights high, headlight low, brake, turn signals, somethign else too) all ZKE codes, or as they told me, from the body controller. I told him i had the rear backup light wire tapped so i could have a backuplight in the bumper and that i had the LCD screen in the car and i showed how it was wired and how i had my driving lights wired in. They said any of those in comibation with the possibility of a few pinched wires from me removing and putting panels back in could cause a short. They also said the BC1 is VERY TOUCHY and can be damaged beyond repair easily.

I dont like the guy working on my car, either. He doesnt seem to like his job too much and wasnt really helping me out with the problem here. It was like it was so bad that I caused a problem with my car. After this, i'm not too sure i would want to take my car back to classic,