9006 to H1 Foglight Swap

[gtopaul]

I bought some replacement Depo foglights off ebay to replace the original busted units on my 94 540. Got around to swapping them today and noticed that the original units have the 9006 bulbs and connectors and the replacement Depo's have a different plug and use H1 bulbs inside. Luckily I had some extra plugs from an old headlight harness laying aroung that would fit the Depo connectors so I just cut off the original foglight connectors and replaced them with the H1 style. I connected the brown wire from the foglight harness to the black ground wire in the Depo foglights and then connected the other multi colored harness wire to the red (bulb) wire in the Depo's. The problem is they don't work. All other lights work normally. I've got a feeling that the problem is with the ground side. It looks like the ground wire just grounds to the inside of the Depo foglight. Do I need to find a better ground location for both of the ground wires? Suggestions appreciated.

Paul L

[Qube]

Something isn't right. If you wire directly to the H1 bulb, does it light? It doesn't matter what lead goes where unless you are using HIDs. There is no polarity involved or anything with incandescent bulbs.

[gtopaul]

Something isn't right. If you wire directly to the H1 bulb, does it light? It doesn't matter what lead goes where unless you are using HIDs. There is no polarity involved or anything with incandescent bulbs.

I initially plugged the foglights into the front side light sockets since they had the same connector and they lit up when I turned the lights on so I know they work. I was replacing the front bumper cover so I had all the front off where it was easy to get to. I'll look at a schematic at work today to see if the grounds are different. I've think the early E34's probably used the H1's and later ones used the 9006's so I'll compare the wiring diagrams for both to see what's different. I'll swap the LKM from my Touring to eliminate that as a problem too.

Thanks.

Paul

[Qube]

I have never seen stock fogs use 9006... are they freeform? Nor have I ever had an issue wiring them up... and believe me I go through/try a lot of lights!

So you plugged the fog lead into the low beams and it fired up fine? So you have power going all the way down... and nothing happens when it hits the new fog lights.

Whatcha mean by grounds? Two wires go into the fog lamp... one to the end of the bulb and the other to the inside of the unit... which effectively is connected to the side of the H1 bulb.

Something is confusing me here. It sounds so simple.

[gtopaul]

I have never seen stock fogs use 9006... are they freeform? Nor have I ever had an issue wiring them up... and believe me I go through/try a lot of lights!

So you plugged the fog lead into the low beams and it fired up fine? So you have power going all the way down... and nothing happens when it hits the new fog lights.

Whatcha mean by grounds? Two wires go into the fog lamp... one to the end of the bulb and the other to the inside of the unit... which effectively is connected to the side of the H1 bulb.

Something is confusing me here. It sounds so simple.

They are the stock 9006 fog light bulbs. They insert into the housing and twist to stay in. One wire is the hot wire and the other is the ground next to the H1 bulb. I pretty much figured it out today at work. When I removed the female plugs from my extra headlight harness I didn't notice that there are long and short plugs. I used the long and they didn't connect to the pins inside the foglight housing. I replaced them with the shorter plugs and now they light up properly. Only problem is now the Foglight msg is on the display on the instrument cluster still. I don't know how that happened but I'll swap out the LKM with my Touring tomorrow and see if anything changes.

Thanks.

Paul

[shogun]

see under
Options: Choose high beam connector (required for install)
under headlights, they have conversion kits
http://www.turnermotorsport.com/html/show_category.asp?txtsearchParamCat=Lighting#Headl ightAssemblies