|
|
|
I'M playing with a BMW Z3 and considering rewiring the rear lights, so the reversing light is dual function with a bright led, ( so I can have an extra taillight, I drive a lot in the dark). It's still more than 10cm away from the brake light and brighter than the standard fog light. Is it Mot legal though? Any testers care to comment?
|
|
|
|
paul99
Part of things
Posts: 414
|
|
May 22, 2019 11:19:15 GMT
|
There's a reason you're not suposed to drive with your foglights on all the time.....
|
|
|
|
|
|
May 22, 2019 12:58:24 GMT
|
Wow.
Just to be super clear.
I'm thinking of Rewiring the lights so the present 21w foglights become 5w taillights.
The foglight function will then be accomplished by a super bright RED Led inside the reversing light. Which will only be used at Mot time.
Construction and Use regs specify 10cm separation between fog and brake light lenses. It will exceed that. It's actually further away than the standard fog light.
Is it Mot compliant to have a reversing light dual function? One bulb for reversing light and Led for fog, if ever used.
|
|
|
|
|
|
May 22, 2019 13:23:19 GMT
|
Having a switchback red & white bulb for fog and reverse lamp is fine for MOTs. A popular choice amongst Japanese imported cars to avoid having an ugly extra fog lamp bolted onto the bumper.
Not sure if there's 2 reverse lamps on the z3? if so you can just use a red bulb in the offside reverse lamp and rewire accordingly without having to use switchback bulbs.
The bit i'm not sure about is having dual tail lights - it's a common thing on japanese imports - so shouldn't be a problem and they all pass MOTs - it just might cause a bit of confusion on a UK model.
|
|
|
|
|
|
May 22, 2019 13:58:36 GMT
|
i converted the o/s reverse light to fog on my import classic wrx and never had an issue...
|
|
'80 s1 924 turbo..hibernating '80 golf gli cabriolet...doing impression of a skip '97 pug 106 commuter...continuing cheapness making me smile!
firm believer in the k.i.s.s and f.i.s.h principles.
|
|
|
|
May 23, 2019 15:35:15 GMT
|
Cheers guy's, spent ages reading lighting rules, seems fine. Only thing you can't double duty is a brake light, but I knew that already. Thanks all.
|
|
|
|
luckyseven
Posted a lot
Owning sneering dismissive pedantry since 1970
Posts: 3,839
Club RR Member Number: 45
|
|
May 23, 2019 17:02:30 GMT
|
Imported RX-7s suffered with a lack of foglights (my first one had a rusty huge thing so ugly it looked like it had come from a Russian truck self-tappered to the bumper). I just cut out the backing of one of the reflectors and mounted a bulb behind that to act as a foglight That way it still worked as a reflector as normal but also as a foglight when you needed it to. Not sure how much room there is in and around Z3 light clusters but it may be worth using the reflector rather than a reverse light?
|
|
|
|
ems1
Club Retro Rides Member
Posts: 318
Club RR Member Number: 5
Member is Online
|
|
May 23, 2019 17:55:28 GMT
|
This has been done on the Manta. I took the fog lamp wire to the drivers side reversing light and fitted a red bulb. Never had any problems for the MOT.
|
|
1985 Manta GT/E 16v 2001 VW T4 Caravelle
|
|
|
|
|
This has been done on the Manta. I took the fog lamp wire to the drivers side reversing light and fitted a red bulb. Never had any problems for the MOT. I did exactly the same and never had a problem with MOT’s
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
It shouldn't be a problem but make sure if the car is post 2009 and fitted with reverse lights that they work
|
|
|
|