Donna,

You are the fastest trigger in these parts.... ha ha ha... I just saw that.

Thanks,
joe

 

^^ LOL!!!

Donna

 

Hey There,
Have you decieded to put on driving lamps yet. I just ordered a set of Hellas, and may want to sell mine, along with brackets.
If you are intrested please let me know. I am not sure of time frame.

Happy Motoring,

Larry

 

Hey There, I am still learning how to reply without the whole world readingit, not that I have anything to hide.

I would love to sell you the driving lamps, but I want to be honest with you. I think you would get a better lamp, and a better deal with aftermarket lamps. Today I ordered the four lamp bracket for the R55 from VIP Coustom Parts, it was $129. They have the two lamp bracket for $79. The brackets look sturdy. I ordered a set of Hella Black Magic from Classic Garage for a $190. I paid almost six hundred for the OEM lights.

The OEM lights are OK, but I think the PIAA lamp or the Hella are a much better lamp, plus you go with several diffrent bulp,lens, and size combos.

I most likely wont get my new lamps installed for at least a week, so you can research, and also get abunch of other thoughts on the subject. If you still want mine, then we will talk. Hope this is OK with you. By the way, How do you like your Clubman? I love mine. I had a 2006 MCS, but it was totaslled about 6 weeks ago, It saved my life. I love my MINI.

Have a great night,

Larry

 

Hey taskmaxter I have them on mine sorry no pic yet but I only installed the actual light but its not hooked up cause I'm waiting for the dealer to get me a switch which is on backorder but I'm not going to install the wiring cause I know someone that works at the dealer and will hook it up for me I'm just being too lazy but I have the wipac version which looks exactly like the oem version but much cheaper. It was really easy to install but does not come w/the wiring harness.

 

Donna,
How do you like the roof rack?

 

Hey Larry, please post back when you get yours installed (with pix of possible) since I'd like to hear hows your went. I'm planning on adding lights to mine in the future as well. Thanks!

 

Hey there - thanks for the info? Where did you order the Wipac from? Can you send a couple of pix? Thanks!

 

We love it. It is very sturdy. We installed it ourselves within 30 minutes or so. We've not had the water leaking issue that some of the others have had. So I'm not sure if that issue has to do with how it was originally installed or not...

Donna

 

where to get the best price for an OEM driving lights including grille and switch with matching interior color trim?

 

Always check Morristown MINI for OEM prices. They always seem to be lower.

 

...or try Classic MINI, also a NAM vendor, which offers a 20% discount on OEM parts. They have a forum on this site.

 

I think they are no more

 

I can only use my driving lights when all the lights are on.....how about yours?
rz

 

No...they're still around....they're my local dealership

First link here: https://www.northamericanmotoring.co...vendor.php?f=1

 

everyone: are the driving lights worth the $510? they look good, but am unsure with the price. I know it would be more expensive to get them aftermarket though....

 

I just finished installing after market driving lights. The lights are Hella 500 and cost $80. The mounting kit was from VIP and cost $75. I've never installed lights before so it took me the better part of a day.
Go to my gallery to see before and after. Later I'll post a setp by step "how to" on installing the lights.

 

Just got my PW/B ClubmanS 30 days ago. Got the driving lights installed-but have not been night driving yet with the long days. I really like the looks of the lights, but mine came with brite white covers that looked out of place. A little black Krylon enamel solved that problem. The lights do work only when your brights are on.
By the way--I love my FIRST MINI-awesome cars

 

I got mine OEM, and LOVE them! Check my gallery for pics!

 

Minipat, thanks for the info and pics, and very nice job doing it yourself! The driving lamps look great! I look forward to your how-to notes, I want my dh to do them for ours. Great prices there too. Once I heard $500 install on top of the $510 already, I took them off the build. But $150ish is definitely a go!

 

To save space I have posted 17 pictures in my Gallery. Just click on Gallery in the upper right corner of this post. The file name corresponds with the instruction steps. Example Step1 goes with picture Light1

Assumptions: A. You have a light kit with your lights that have the wiring, relay, switch, fuses, connectors. Some kits are very good and give you everything you need and some don’t. Check your kit.
B. Your kit has wiring instructions
C. These steps are what I did for my lights and may be helpful hints to you but are in no means the only way to install lights. You are responsible for your own install.
D. You have a relaxing day to do this

Step 1 Very carefully remove the chrome strip on the bottom of the grill. It pops out. Fingers worked well on this
Step 2 Remove the grill. There are 4 plastic pins where you pop the head then pull it out.
Step 3 In the Gallery picture “Light3” is a picture of the pin, part way pulled out.
Step 4 On the bottom of the grill are little tabs that you squeeze. Some you squeeze left and some right.
Step 5 Look at picture “Light5” to see what the tab looks like and squeezing will now make sense.
Step 6 With the grill off use a 13mm socked for the bolt and a 3mm allen key or T20 tork bit for the screw. These mounting points are the same points the factory brackets uses for mounting.
Step 7 Picture “Lights7” is the bracket mounted.
Step 8 I ran the wire to connect the lights across the front of the engine compartment with the hood release wire. There are some clips there you can use to keep the wire from getting into trouble.
Step 9 There are small holes on the right & left you can use to bring the wires from the engine compartment to the front grill area. The factory uses these holes for the same purpose.
Step 9A Right about now is a good time for an ice cold beer. Sorry no pictures, you will have to get your own.
Step 10 I wired the lights to a switch inside the car. The easiest way to get the wires to the inside is on the passenger side of the car. First take out the battery. Some people might make this step one but you have not connected any wires yet so no problem doing it here.
Step 11 With the battery out you will see a cover over some wires. Take the cover off.
Step 12 Picture “Light12” is what you will see with the cover off.
Step 13 Cut a small slit in the rubber gasket and push the wires through. Put the cover back on and re-install the battery BUT DON”T CONNECT THE BATTERY CABLE YET.
Step 14 Cut the grill so it fits over the bracket. Use what ever you like to cut it, a red hot xacto knife, Dremmel tool, what ever you like.
Step 15 I wanted to have the lights go on with the high beams. So I wired to the switch inside the car and the lire supplying power to the high beams. But which wire controls the high beams……I got out a test lamp and probed the wires in the wiring harness behind the head lamp until I found the right one. Picture “Light15 & 16” are pictures of the wire for the high beam and how I tapped into it. The light kit had the necessary connector. I have XENON lights. So these pictures of the wires are for XENON lights. Make sure you check your harness for the right wire.
Step 17 The fuse box has an excellent place to tap into the battery without having to run a wire all the way to the battery. Picture “Light17” shows the fuse box and where I connected. The factory also uses this point to connect to the battery for driving lights.
After connecting to the battery wire in the fuse box you can connect back the cables to the battery. Remember you left them unconnected in step 13.
Now put the grill and trim back on and connect the wires per the wiring diagram with your kit.
If you wired to a switch it’s up to you where and how you want to mount it.
If you need more detail drop me a note.

 

MiniPat,

Really nice writeup.

Larry

 

Mebbie we can get some snapshots of a dark road with and without the lights on hmmm?

 

Mine came with the car, but than again, it only sat on the showroom floor for a couple of hours until I waltzed in "just looking around". I love them, even knowing that the aftermarket ones are probably better. They do perform well enough for my needs on the dark twisties .

 

Here are driving lights on my clubman. They are OEM but I made my own mounting system ($18). This allowed the light to match the stripe location (classic Shelby Mistang style).