ajsellors
A2OC Donor
A while ago I bought a set of OSRAM LEDriving FOG slights for my A2. I chose these because I wanted a quality and approved Daylight Running Light (DRL).
http://www.osram.com/osram_com/news...-led/ledriving-fog---led-fog-lights/index.jsp
These replace existing round fog lights and have two sets of LED arrays, one with a broad dispersed beam for daylight use and a different set which provides a narrow horizontal strip of light to act as a fog light. Thus although the car’s original fog lights are replaced, the fog light function is still available and probably improved over the original.
With the install I wanted to make it look like it was OEM so the biggest issue is the mounting of the lights themselves. The OSRAM lights themselves have a 90mm diameter circular housing with an almost flat glass face. The mounting bracket provided with the “generic” package also assumes a flat front 4 hole mounting.
Inspired by this post, rather than fabricate a new mounting bracket and associated cowling to go round the light, I decided to re-purpose a set of A2 specific normal fog lights as brackets for the OSRAM units.
http://www.a2oc.net/forum/showthread.php?26285-OSRAM-LED-Fog-amp-DRL-lights-install
As I would likely need to modify and possibly end up destroying the A2 flog lights I bought a set of cheap pattern replacement fog lights from eBay to work with. The parts used were as follows:
Placing the OSRAM light and A2 fog light side by side shows the degree to which the front face of the A2 light is angled. Placing the OSRAM light in the A2 flog light opening in the bumper on its own would either require the light to be recessed and the gap filled by a cowl or the light to protruding on the outer sides. Fitting the light on its own would not retain the OEM streamlined look of the car’s bumper.
The solution is to use the front part of the A2 fog light with the glass remaining to face the OSRAM light behind. The “new” light then fills the space in the bumper correctly and looks OEM.
By removing the rear reflector of the A2 fog lights, the OSRAM units actually side straight in. The OSRAM light’s exterior diameter exactly matches the A2 light’s interior diameter so no modification is required to enable this. This is slightly different from the post linked above whereby the A2 light required enlarging to allow the OSRAM light to fit. I suspect this is because I am using a non-OEM lights and the plastic is thinner than the original equipment A2 light – the thinner plastic makes for a larger internal diameter and so allows the light to fit without modification.
I did however make a slight modification to the A2 fog light, the removal of the interior flange. The A2 light has a flange near the glass on the inside which the reflector rubber seal would fit up against. This flange limits how far the OSRAM light can be inserted. As a test, I removed the flange from one light and measured the difference.
The light on the left has the flange removed and the one on the right, retained. The pencil line shown on the OSRAM light on the right indicates how far extra the light could be inserted if the flange was not present. Removing the flange has two benefits. Firstly it increases the sideways visibility of the OSRAM light and secondly it enables the existing mounting bolt holes on the OSRAM light to line up with the reflector pivot holes on the A2 light as can be seen by the light on the left.
To check the mounting and visibility differences of the two methods (with and without flange) I fitted the lights to an A2 with the DRLs wired as a bench test to check for position and visibility.
This picture shows the OSRAM light on the left fitted with the flange and for comparison the original A2 fog light on the right of the picture.
The difference between with and without flange is marginal from the side view. As I had already modified one light to remove the flange I decided to remove the one on the other as I would aid mounting as I could bolt the light together without modification.
The other problem which this test highlighted however is the vertical position. The A2 fog lights are designed to shine downwards onto the road and not upwards to eye level. The OSRAM lights however have part of the DRL light pattern across the top of the light and the standard positioning of the A2 fog lights causes this to be partly obscured. The picture above which was taken from low down near the ground, shows how close the upper part of the light pattern is with the bumper cowling.
To resolve this and also improve the sideways visibility I chose to modify the A2 fog light fixing such that the light is mounted lower than it would be normally and closer to the centre of the car. The A2 light is fixed by two screws through tabs on the inner side and a peg that fits into a hole in the bumper on the outer side. To move the light position I attached a new longer peg on top of the existing one, following the angle of the front glass. The peg was made of an 8mm diameter, 25mm long plastic rod. The new peg was fixed onto the existing one with a small amount of hot glue and then further secured by two small zip ties. Additional hot glue was added to prevent the zip ties slipping off. On the mounting lugs, the outward surface was made flat by filling the recess with glue such that the new screw head position can overhang the edge.
The modified A2 fog lights assembled with the OSRAM units. New 10mm M4 bolts and washers were used to secure the lights together as the original bolts on the OSRAM lights were too short.
The OSRAM lights are driven by a control unit. Each light is connected to the control unit by 4 wires, two for each of the separate lighting elements. These are connected to the control unit via supplied in-line waterproof connectors. The length of these cables means that the control unit must be fitted side the engine bay. Although all relevant feeds could be obtained from wiring inside the engine bay, as I wanted a control switch inside the cabin and wanted a neater, more OEM looking installation, I chose to fit the control unit inside the car and make all connections to interior wiring. The lights would therefore need to be connected using a new loom between the bumper mounting points and car interior. The routing and fitting of this loom would be identical to that when retrofitting standard fog lights to an A2, except that this loom would contain 4 independent wires from each light.
A new loom was made containing 8 wires from inside the car to the bottom of the front panel under the radiator where it diverges, 4 wires either side to each of the lights.
The loom was routed from the passenger side A pillar, through the grommet behind the coolant expansion tank, across the side of the engine bay to the front and then down the left (nearside) of the radiator. This route follows existing wiring. Once at the bottom of the radiator, one offshoot goes under the radiator, following the existing fog light wiring and to the fog light position on the right side of the car.
http://www.osram.com/osram_com/news...-led/ledriving-fog---led-fog-lights/index.jsp
These replace existing round fog lights and have two sets of LED arrays, one with a broad dispersed beam for daylight use and a different set which provides a narrow horizontal strip of light to act as a fog light. Thus although the car’s original fog lights are replaced, the fog light function is still available and probably improved over the original.
With the install I wanted to make it look like it was OEM so the biggest issue is the mounting of the lights themselves. The OSRAM lights themselves have a 90mm diameter circular housing with an almost flat glass face. The mounting bracket provided with the “generic” package also assumes a flat front 4 hole mounting.
Inspired by this post, rather than fabricate a new mounting bracket and associated cowling to go round the light, I decided to re-purpose a set of A2 specific normal fog lights as brackets for the OSRAM units.
http://www.a2oc.net/forum/showthread.php?26285-OSRAM-LED-Fog-amp-DRL-lights-install
As I would likely need to modify and possibly end up destroying the A2 flog lights I bought a set of cheap pattern replacement fog lights from eBay to work with. The parts used were as follows:
Placing the OSRAM light and A2 fog light side by side shows the degree to which the front face of the A2 light is angled. Placing the OSRAM light in the A2 flog light opening in the bumper on its own would either require the light to be recessed and the gap filled by a cowl or the light to protruding on the outer sides. Fitting the light on its own would not retain the OEM streamlined look of the car’s bumper.
The solution is to use the front part of the A2 fog light with the glass remaining to face the OSRAM light behind. The “new” light then fills the space in the bumper correctly and looks OEM.
By removing the rear reflector of the A2 fog lights, the OSRAM units actually side straight in. The OSRAM light’s exterior diameter exactly matches the A2 light’s interior diameter so no modification is required to enable this. This is slightly different from the post linked above whereby the A2 light required enlarging to allow the OSRAM light to fit. I suspect this is because I am using a non-OEM lights and the plastic is thinner than the original equipment A2 light – the thinner plastic makes for a larger internal diameter and so allows the light to fit without modification.
I did however make a slight modification to the A2 fog light, the removal of the interior flange. The A2 light has a flange near the glass on the inside which the reflector rubber seal would fit up against. This flange limits how far the OSRAM light can be inserted. As a test, I removed the flange from one light and measured the difference.
The light on the left has the flange removed and the one on the right, retained. The pencil line shown on the OSRAM light on the right indicates how far extra the light could be inserted if the flange was not present. Removing the flange has two benefits. Firstly it increases the sideways visibility of the OSRAM light and secondly it enables the existing mounting bolt holes on the OSRAM light to line up with the reflector pivot holes on the A2 light as can be seen by the light on the left.
To check the mounting and visibility differences of the two methods (with and without flange) I fitted the lights to an A2 with the DRLs wired as a bench test to check for position and visibility.
This picture shows the OSRAM light on the left fitted with the flange and for comparison the original A2 fog light on the right of the picture.
The difference between with and without flange is marginal from the side view. As I had already modified one light to remove the flange I decided to remove the one on the other as I would aid mounting as I could bolt the light together without modification.
The other problem which this test highlighted however is the vertical position. The A2 fog lights are designed to shine downwards onto the road and not upwards to eye level. The OSRAM lights however have part of the DRL light pattern across the top of the light and the standard positioning of the A2 fog lights causes this to be partly obscured. The picture above which was taken from low down near the ground, shows how close the upper part of the light pattern is with the bumper cowling.
To resolve this and also improve the sideways visibility I chose to modify the A2 fog light fixing such that the light is mounted lower than it would be normally and closer to the centre of the car. The A2 light is fixed by two screws through tabs on the inner side and a peg that fits into a hole in the bumper on the outer side. To move the light position I attached a new longer peg on top of the existing one, following the angle of the front glass. The peg was made of an 8mm diameter, 25mm long plastic rod. The new peg was fixed onto the existing one with a small amount of hot glue and then further secured by two small zip ties. Additional hot glue was added to prevent the zip ties slipping off. On the mounting lugs, the outward surface was made flat by filling the recess with glue such that the new screw head position can overhang the edge.
The modified A2 fog lights assembled with the OSRAM units. New 10mm M4 bolts and washers were used to secure the lights together as the original bolts on the OSRAM lights were too short.
The OSRAM lights are driven by a control unit. Each light is connected to the control unit by 4 wires, two for each of the separate lighting elements. These are connected to the control unit via supplied in-line waterproof connectors. The length of these cables means that the control unit must be fitted side the engine bay. Although all relevant feeds could be obtained from wiring inside the engine bay, as I wanted a control switch inside the cabin and wanted a neater, more OEM looking installation, I chose to fit the control unit inside the car and make all connections to interior wiring. The lights would therefore need to be connected using a new loom between the bumper mounting points and car interior. The routing and fitting of this loom would be identical to that when retrofitting standard fog lights to an A2, except that this loom would contain 4 independent wires from each light.
A new loom was made containing 8 wires from inside the car to the bottom of the front panel under the radiator where it diverges, 4 wires either side to each of the lights.
The loom was routed from the passenger side A pillar, through the grommet behind the coolant expansion tank, across the side of the engine bay to the front and then down the left (nearside) of the radiator. This route follows existing wiring. Once at the bottom of the radiator, one offshoot goes under the radiator, following the existing fog light wiring and to the fog light position on the right side of the car.
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