I recently changed my parking lights to LEDs, (the ones on top of the fog lights) and now sometimes the lights fail to turn on. When you unlock your doors, usually the parking lights (in the front and back) would turn on to show that your car responded and gives you a pathway light. My car does this but only sometimes. Sometimes it would do the right thing and other times the doors will unlock but the car stays completely dark with no lights. Anyone else have problems? This is starting to really **** me off..

Thanks,
John

 

This forum is full of problems that arise after someone changes something on their MINI. The ECU is pretty sensitive to it's environment. You've changed from one type if hardware with a particular impedance to something with another. Just spitballing here but I'll bet what's pissing you off pissed off your MINI first.

 

LEDs don't work outside of the car. You will get error messages. They are only good inside of the car where sensors don't exist

 

If I had a 1$ for every person who installs LED's and had an issue...I'd be rich!!
LED's used on exterior positions usually REQUIRE a resistor to make them look electrically identical to a regular bulb......so you end up a LED, and a little resistor, making heat, and using electricity in about the same amount as a regular bulb for 4x the cost....and the resistor tends to FAIL more than the plain old bulb...
So whats the point...oh..yeah...looks cool...

 

LED's are cheap, and I have actually had LED's installed everywhere possible on the outside of my car since September .. and ZERO <--- do you see that? ZERO issues!!

I currently have them in my front turn signals, reverse lights, tag lights, the little DRL above the fog. Only place I didn't do them were the side markers, no point. Resistors were only required for the turn signals.

 

This issue is related to the headlamp switch setting. You'll only get the lights on when your headlamps are in AUTO mode. Any other mode and they won't light when you unlock.

Took me two weeks to figure this out.

My car is LED (Canbus) parking front light equipped with no issues.

I also have side marker and rear plate light LEDS installed with zero issues.

 

+1 you have to have the lights on , clicked all the way up on the stalk. Then the parking ( position light ), marker lights, taillights dim up and down. When you lock/unlock.

The Leds we carry have the built in resistor so you don't have to worry about a bulb out errors on the dash.

 

ECS is correct about bulb errors. I recently installed their Zizza position LEDs. The work fine and no errors, although, for some reason they do flicker if you do not turn on the headlights. When you turn the headlights off, the LEDs remain steady.

I contacted ECS about this. They were unaware of this issue. They happily sent me new ones to try out - no charge.

I haven't had time to put them in yet though.

Great customer service.

 

Thanks, The Ziza bulbs will test flicker a couple times at start up, its the MINI LKM system checking for the bulbs/ power sequence, looks like a cop car a little. Then you are good to go and they will stay on strong and bright with no bulb out errors. These are just for the outside bulbs connections , interior Ziza Led bulbs don't do this because the MINI interior system is a little different.

Thanks

 

+2374627834

The "strobe effect" as I like to call it, is normal at start up on our MINI's. BMW's do this as well. Exactly what ECS said.