Thanks for the info on the Tacoma fog light/ switch upgrade mixman, I finished the install today. I like that the Fog light switch stays on so during the day they are drls.

 

Awesome! Did you use that module from Amazon to connect it up?

 

Yes. Worked perfect after I realized I wrapped the electrical tape too tight, holding the button in lol

 

LOL - I almost did that too but caught it. I ultimately wrapped it in some neoprene foam tape to make sure no rattling or anything and stuck it behind the headlight switch (plenty of room). This is the tape, 2" wide x 1/8" thick. Great for replacing original degraded foam wire wrapping to prevent rattles, also good for just insulating other loose bits to prevent noises form vibrations. https://smile.amazon.com/dp/B07VCQJV...dDbGljaz10cnVl

 

Here is another one I figured out the other day. If you have the optional off road roof rack or brush guard lights from what I can tell there is one wiring harness that gets installed regardless of whether you have the roof rack lights, brush guard lights, or both. Mine came with the optional brush guard lights. While I prefer originality, those lights are frankly not all that great when compared to more modern lighting. I swapped mine out for a pair of Hella Rallye 4000X led driving lights. I have the switch on the ceiling console already for turning them on and off and they work great but I wanted to look at having them cut on automatically when I cut the high beams on. So I looked at replacing the switch first with a 3 position one that I could configure as Off/Auto/On where auto they would cut on with the high beams. Anyways I got to poking around and pulled up some wiring. The high beams relay uses a negative trigger from the BCM. So I checked the off road lights relay which is tucked up under the dash above the parking brake and what I found is not one, but two relays zip tied together with a bit of foam around each (prevent rattles). Interestingly both were being triggered by the one switch but the second relay was not connected to anything, there was a wiring pigtail and plug not hooked to anything. So on looking at the schematics and checking with a meter I determined that the off road light relays are using a positive trigger. So to do what I want I'll need another relay since the high beams trigger is negative and the off road lights trigger is positive. Well since the second relay for the off road lights is unused (for me anyways) I just used that one. The high beam trigger from the BCM is easy to get behind the headlight switch and easy to locate the wire and use a scotchlock to tap into it. It is the black/white wire coming from the first pin on the grey BCM connector. The optional off road lights relays are literally above a foot under there above the parking brake (mine did have enough excess wire that I was able to have them almost touching the floor. So I decided to forego replacing the switch itself and just wire it so that the brush guard lights will always cut on with the high beams. They can still manually be turned on with the switch on the ceiling console as well. I just rewired the second unused off road lights to do what I needed. Basically changed it so that the coil gets its positive from the off road harness (already have ignition positive that goes to the switch), and the coil trigger is from the BCM wire I tapped, and the relay connects the same ignition positive to the same wire coming from the switch (positive relay trigger). Works perfect.

Of course if you have BOTH optional off road lights then you will not have a spare relay to do this and would need to add one. Also the Hella Rallye 4000x LED driving lights are very expensive at around $250 each but I got lucky and scored a pair of them used but in near perfect like new condition for less than the cost of a single one. The throw on them is amazing very brightly lighting the road probably a good half a mile in front of the vehicle. It is in fact so bright that some road signs reflect back so much that they are nearly too bright. But since I live in a very rural area, driving out there at night, it is very helpful to have as much advance warning of deer as possible in order to avoid hitting one. Not having to manually cut the Hella lights on and off every time is very nice. Ultimatley though, I think I will replace the ceiling console switch with a 3 position one so that I will have more control and can choose off/auto/on instead. As I have it now, there is no way to not have the Hella lights turn on with the high beams. I did find that Rigid sells a high quality Cherry 3 position switch (Rigid #40181) that is the same size as our factory off road lights switch. So I've ordered one of those to replace the switch itself. I think if I add a roof light(s) I will do the same with a 3 position switch so that they can have an "auto" function too. I'll also add, while Hella calls the Rallye 4000X LED "driving" lights, they cannot be used with any oncoming traffic. They do put 99% of the light way down the road and very focused and incredibly bright and good quality, they do also have quite a good bit of stray light that goes up high that you can even see in the trees so they also will blind oncoming drivers.

 

Pictures please!

 

I did not get any pictures of the actual stock off-road lights relays but I did modify a schematic of the off-road lights to make it simpler when I went under the dash to modify the wiring and a picture of the front end showing the Hella lights.... I'll take a pic of the actual lights on the front in a few. I've also recently had most of the interior out and had the headliner redone (two tone), did the airbox mod to add a cabin air filter (really needed that - incredible amount of leaves and crap was in there), added a backup camera, added the factory series parallel relay module for electric fans (from a GM truck) and the new fusebox shroud with the additional lid. Have an aluminum radiator here and will soon install that and convert to factory electric fans. On the below - the off-road lamps relay 2 wiring is modified from what that schematic originally looked like.

 

Thanks for the advice mixman! It is a pain using the roof switch to turn light bar on and off. I believe I only had roof mounted off road lights. I can’t find any unused connectors under dash. Here is a pic of mine. The blue and purple wires are for the roof lights. The single yellow wire is 12v key for amazon switch. Does yours have an additional plug in this relay junction box? Also Is there any possibility the Hellas will fit in the drl opening? I might rather have additional high beam light at the expense of losing the fogs. I’m not super impressed with the Morimoto led headlights. They are bright but for the money I expected more.

 

can't wait to the pics of those hellas mounted. omg two tone headliner? I need a pic of that too. I thought about going with a black suede headliner as a friend did it and it didn't add much heat to the cabin. There's some guy on one of the forums who actually did an outerspace lit headliner with shooting stars in it. crazy. Also, I'd like to see a pic of your new fusebox shroud and a link for that and the actual electric fans you will be using...Where can I get that fusebox shroud and what are the exact fans to get? Are they both off any chevy truck or specific to an 08-09 h2. I think I'll need to convert the oil t& trans cooler lines to the -08-09, although we have some people here who say you can bend the old ones to get around the fan shroud. I think i'll pass on that and just upgrade the lines. I'll definitely be paying attention to your posts on the fans as thats my next project.

 

No way you could get those Hella 4000x into the DRL spots. They are way too deep - I had to drill new holes further out on the stock brush guard light mounts just to put them there. They would hit the grill if I tried to use the holes for the stock off road lights...

There are also two relays further up from there for the off-road lights. If you turn the switch on/off on the ceiling console you should hear them click behind the dash. Mine have enough extra wire that I can hang them way down to mess with them. They are nice water tight relays too. You can remove the relay from the socket and then remove a connector retainer and then extract the actual connectors to rearrange them if you want. Attached are the original un-modified schematics for the off road lighting. The second relay is used if yours came with both the roof and brush guard lights, otherwise it just uses one of the relays. You can compare the attached with how I reconfigured mine. Also a pic of the relays....