DIY: HID Fog Lights
 

HID FOG LIGHT UPGRADE

I swapped out my H11 halogens a little while back and replaced them with a HID kit. The install was pretty straight forward and only took at few hours. The kit I bought was made by “N-Motion Auto” and cost about 250 USD. So here is the DIY I promised :D.



(I bought a kit, you do not have to. All these components can be bought on ebay for less)



Link to my first thread:

https://www.rx8club.com/series-i-exterior-appearance-body-kits-27/hid-fog-lights-installed-55621/



Parts Needed:



(2) HID Ballast
(2) H11 Rebased D2S Bulbs
(2) Igniters (if not in ballast)
(4) 1” Stainless Bolts (1/4 20)
(4) Stainless Nuts (1/4 20)
(4) Stainless 1/4” Washers
(5ft) 1/4" Split Loom
(5ft) 3/8” Split Loom
Wire Ties
Shrink Tube
Black Paint
Solder



Tools Needed:



Phillips Screw Driver
Drill
1/4” Drill Bit
10mm Socket and Wrench
Jack
Jack Stands
Wheel Blocks
Soldering Iron
Multi-meter

1)Buy everything listed above

2)Wait for it to arrive.

3)Get started!

4)Disconnect the negative lead from the battery.

5)Then jack up the front of the car and lower in onto the jack stands, be sure to use a wheel block.

6)Remove the plastic sheet covering the fog lights. You don't have to remove the rubber flap that hangs down, that will come off with the whole sheet. There will be three screws and a half dozen or so plastic snaps. It helps if you turn the wheel towards from you.

7)Next, remove the bottom and top oil cooler bolts and remove the black bracket. (10 mm wrench)

8)Now you must remove the fog light housing. There are two screws on the bottom and one on the top (the top one is hard to get to). Now remove the fog light.

9)Take the black bracket in drill two ¼” holes near the top. Remove the back plate of the ballast housing and use the holes you just drilled as a template to drill two more in the ballast plate.

10) Spray paint the holes in the bracket with the black paint; this will keep it from rusting in the future. I did not need to spray paint the ballast plate because it was aluminum. If your ballast is not aluminum, I recommend painting it also.

11)Use the bolts and nuts to fasten them together. Then reattach the back plate to the ballast housing.

12)Next, get the fog light and use a long screw driver to force the reflector forward in order to make the longer rebased H11 bulb fit correctly.

13) Check to make sure that the new bulb fits, if so, take the bulb out and reinstall the fog light housing. Two screws on the bottom and one on the top.

14) Now reinstall the oil cooler bracket with the ballast attached. (10 mm wrench)

15) Insert the new H11 bulb.

16) Cut the old H11 wire harness off of the car. Strip the wires back about 1/2”. Cut the wires from the ballast to the appropriate length and strip them back about a 1/2”. Next, slip about 1” of shrink tube down each ballast wire. Now twist the positive wire from the ballast to the blue wire from the car. Do the same for the other wire. Now, solder the wires together. After the solder cools, slide the shrink tube over the soldered joint and rub the iron over the tube to shrink it. (I strongly suggest using a volt multi-meter to double check the polarity, if you reverse the polarity to the ballast you will ruin it)

17) If you bought a kit the next step is simple, just connect the bulb to the ballast with the supplied connectors. If you bought the components you need to solder the wires together just like step 15.

18) Now slide split loom over both the wire sets going to and from the ballast. Be sure to slide it on the entire length of the wire. Do not skip this step! The wires from the ballast to the bulbs ignite the bulbs with over 20,000 volts. So, it is important that you cover them with slip loom.

19) Use wire ties to fasten the split loom to the car. For obvious reasons, don’t skip this step either.

20) Reattach the plastic sheet that covers the fogs and oil coolers.

21) Reconnect the battery and test you new HID fog lights.

22) Jack up the car and remove the jack stands and wheel block, and then lower the car.

23) Start your car you’ll have two warning lights. Turn the steering wheel all the way the right and then all the way to the left to reset the DSC, that will shut off one warning light. The remaining light will stay on until you restart the car.

P.S. I had to readjust my fog lights because the HID’s light output was much more defined.



YOU’RE DONE!



Now enjoy your insanely bright fog lights.



I have some 350z projectors on order, my next project is to convert the fog lights to projectors, that way I will have two cut off lines.

thanks man, can't believe all i had to do is push back the reflector... tip on getting the top screw, an angle driver with a long extension will help a lot

Can we see some pictures?

This is a first class DIY, RR! Great job! :D

Need help-Changing foglight bulbs
 

I thought I saw a way to get to your foglights through the front wheel wells. I am just going to change to another H11. Please advise.

Yes, you can get to the from the wheel well. Look at step 6.

You can also undo 3 screws per side on the flat plastic shroud under the bumper and reach up underneath to get at the foglight bulbs.

Nice job!
i already have a set of xtech 5000k HID kit H11's sitting around in my closet. My questions are: 1)what is a D2S bulb?? AND 2)since the stock fogs arent projector, doenst it blind you when you look at them......do they have a nice line/effect???

don't take me from wrong.
the other day i was trying to change the bulbs (not to HID) and i was trying to take out the bulb and i couldn't. Isn't it clockwise that it comes out? I found water contaminants within the housing maybe its stuck by corrosion? is there any lock i have take out before unlocking the bulb?

best regards

Yeah, it's clockwise (from the back,) and no, no lock to take out. You're probably right about corrosion. I've had that issue with bulbs before (not in this car.) Just give it some more muscle (if you can, with the bad leverage there,) and hope nothing breaks.

3000k conversion
 

I finally did my 3000k HID conversion this weekend. 3000k HID burners are just 4300k burners with a selective yellow coating. The color is quite similar to normal halogen bulbs with yellow coating for fog lights. The kit I used was a cheapy Ebay kit (came to $75 or $85 shipped,) and the brand was Xentech. Can't really recommend the brand, as one of the ballasts I received worked once, and then wouldn't fire the burner up again. The seller shipped me out a replacement ballast no questions asked.
The conversion was very easy, and no modification to the fog housing was needed. The position of the actual capsule (where the light comes from) was very close to the H11 filament relative to the base. I'd say the entire capsule fit within the length of the filament, so no major alignment issues. The HID burner was of course longer than the H11 bulb, but it actually fit without too much interference with the glare blocker (the piece of metal in the housing that covers the front of the bulb.) The first one I did pushed the blocker a mm or 2, but didn't put much pressure on it. The second one touched it, but didn't really move it at all.
The beam pattern looks great. It's not noticeably different than it was before, just brighter and yellower. The fogs actually put out enough light now to drive without the headlights (I've done the foglight rewire,) and it doesn't seem to bother oncoming drivers. I'm not sure if it's because my fogs were aimed lower to start with, they do seem to put most of their light into the ground, or if it's because of a better bulb match with the newer kits, or just the yellow coloring (and reduced brightness) is less irritating.
All in all, I'd highly recommend it. I'd say about an hour job (took me about 2, including taking off my front wheels, cleaning the rims while I had the wheels off, and finding a good spot for the ballast.)
Unfortunately I didn't get any decent beam shots. I meant to get a shot of the old fogs some night with daylight WB (so you could compare the color,) but never got around to it. I can still take shots of the fogs with and w/o the headlights if anyone is interested. I do have a couple pics of the interesting parts of the install I'll post later.

Whoa, I forgot about this thread. I have since upgraded the fogs to hid projectors. Much better output.

RR, was the change to projectors fairly straight forward?

details man, we need DETAILS!!!! ;)


Rodger: when are we installing my set? :D:

I've seen that thread. That was part of the reason I wanted to post my experience. I didn't see most of the drawbacks that other HID conversions had. I'm sure projectors are better, but given how little time and money I invested on this, it's almost worth it as just a test. A friend of mine wants to add fogs to his Z, so I may help him out with that, and if the results are much better may go for it myself (probably not. I'm satisfied.)

Projectors offer a huge improvement in light spread and output compared to the stock reflectors.

Working HID's probably also make a huge improvement... The second original ballast I got in the kit crapped out after 2 days of use. No word back from the seller so far this time. Gotta follow up with him again. Also I've noticed fairly significant radio interference (FM, I don't use AM, but presume it's at least as bad.)
I cracked open the first dead ballast and found there were 2 resistors that were only soldered on one side. They appeared to be in the igniter circuit. Also there was a location near the input of the board marked for a 4700uF cap that wasn't populated. I guess the manufacturer decided to save $1 rather than worry about radio interference.

If you're referring to this: http://www.therpmstore.com/product_i...products_id=38

I'd email Danny at the RPM store and ask him, he's pretty quick to respond to emails.

That's a pretty good price for slimline for not having to deal with Ebay, and a lifetime warranty. I ended up with nothing whatsoever from my HID ebay purchase. I sent all the crap back because all 4 ballasts I got failed within a week of use, and the seller claims it got lost in the mail. The whole ordeal took months, so I had no recourse.
Has anybody used the RPM Store kits? Do they have any radio interference issues?

i just did a buy from ebay for hids h11's i got 6000ks and i literaly took 30 minutes to put them on they were simple plg and play and i will say they look gorgeous but now i have to change all the other ones cause the headlights are a little dimmer then the fogs now i will say nice nstructions but i just took the mud gaurdds down a bit the only hard part was finding a mounting place for the ballasts