[scotty305]

First off, thanks to OKsubaru for telling me about this mod. He gets the credit for the idea, I just wrote up a little tutorial and took some pictures. Here we go:



This is a little 'how-to' for removing the 'cap' covering the H3 bulb in te stock foglights. Removing this cap made my foglights noticeably brighter. I already had PIAA 85W Superwhite bulbs, but I noticed a big difference in the amount of light directly in front of me. This mod could cause your foglights to be too bright for approaching motorists' comfort and/or safety. I treat my foglights like my high beams, I never use them when there are other cars nearby. The tricky thing is that you need to put your fog lamp in a hot oven for a few minutes, to melt the glue holding the glass housing onto the plastic.

Tools needed: oven, hot pads, phillips screwdriver (or 10mm socket wrench w/ 3" drive extension), small flathead screwdriver, medium flathead screwdriver (I used the flat part of a swiss army knife), needle-nose pliers,


This is the stock Subaru foglight from my 2000 2.5RS.
(01before.jpg)

 

[scotty305]

Notice the 'cap' covering the light bulb.
(02before.jpg)

 

[scotty305]

The 'cap' is not reflective on the inside. It appears that its only purpose is to block out light.

You might want to preheat your oven to 250 degrees Fahrenheit.

 

[scotty305]

To remove the fog light, take off these three screws. The innermost screw on the top is for adjustment purposes, and does not hold the light in place.

 

[scotty305]

You might want to remove all the minor parts from the back of the lamp, just to be safe. I hate the smell of burning plastic. Also, make sure you remove the H3 bulb and the two metal clips that hold the glass to the plastic.

 

[scotty305]

The 'cap' is held on by these two metal clips.

 

[scotty305]

A better view of one of the clips.

 

[scotty305]

Pry them up with a small screwdriver, and bend them straight using the needle-nose pliers. This will allow the cap to be removed from the fog light.

 

[scotty305]

Now put your fog lamp in the oven for about 8-12 minutes. This melts the glue that holds the glass part of the lamp to the plastic part. You might need to turn up the heat a little about a minute before you remove the for lamp. Then remove the lamp from the oven (don't burn yourself) and pry the glass from the plastic. You might want to mark the plastic and the glass so that you know how to line them back up when you put them back together. Be careful not to get glue on the face of the glass. It won't come off easily.

Then pull the cap off the reflector. If you straightened the clips correctly, it should slip right off without much effort. You might need to go back and re-straighten the clips a little.

Put the glass back on the plastic, replace the two clips that held them together, and put the lamp back in the oven so the glue will melt again, re-sealing the lamp.


It should look like this when you're done.

 

[scotty305]

Nothing covering the bulb. This should look even better if your bulb is clear instead of blue-colored.

 

[scotty305]

Look at that happy car. You can barely notice that the fog lights are different during the daytime.

 

[Guest]

Do you suppose, by any chance, that those little caps are there to keep the lights from blinding oncoming traffic? ( filled with sarcasm in case you couldn't tell)

In the days when the lenses dictated the beam pattern, the little caps weren't needed as the lenses weren't clear. But now with the multi-reflector lamps (headlights, foglights, anything with a clear lense) they put that little cap in there to prevent other drivers from looking straight at the bulbs.

In my books this mod is right up there with angling the fog lights up 20 degrees. Where's that monkey smilie when you need it?

 

[RS25.com]

I think the assumption here is that you only use these with your high beams now...

 

[scotty305]

"This mod could cause your foglights to be too bright for approaching motorists' comfort and/or safety. I treat my foglights like my high beams, I never use them when there are other cars nearby."

My line of thinking is this: the fog lights make my car stand out at night. I don't want to stand out, especially to cops. So I only use my fog lights when I'm driving fast late at night on empty mountain roads. They light up the corners very nicely. When I'm just cruising around, I keep my fog lights covered. On a side note, there's rarely fog where I live.

I'm actually looking for a way to make my fog lights tied into the high beams, so that they will only turn on when the high beams are on.


I thought about removing the cap from my headlights, too. I probably won't do this, though, I don't want to blind people unless my high beams are on.


-scott-

 

[Guest]

Oh. My bad. sorry.

Unfortunately a lot of ric ahem. A lot of kids. ahem. A lot of these "new" Impreza owners will see this mod and do it, then run their fogs 24/7.

 

[Wizard of O.Z.]

Hmmm.... run foglights on high beams. But don't you use lowbeams when it's foggy?

 

[scotty305]

The ideal lighting setup for driving in fog would be fog lamps only, not even using your low beams. I don't know why subaru and many other manufacturers chose to implement their fog lamps so that they only work when the low beams are on.

I hate it when people blind me, and I don't want to blind people. That's why I am still using the stock 55W bulbs for my low beams (and highs also).

-scott-

 

[Imprezawd]

I have seen these tend to heat up some areas it usually want made to heat up like that

 

[Peaty]

So I only use my fog lights when I'm driving fast late at night on empty mountain roads.

What you want to do is get some driving lights. Fog lamps are have a low wide blunt pattern. If you drive fast you will over drive the lamps. Sure it lights up the road directly in front and to the side nicely. But if you see something with fog lamp light that you didn't with you headlamps you are gonna hit it.

Our fog lamps pattern is determined by the reflector in the back the cap in the front is there for a reason. to maintain beam integrity. Removing the cap changes to pattern in ways it wasn't made to do. Taking the cap off will not make the beam into a driving lamp it will just scatter the light willy nilly and blind people and squirrels.

Take a look here to see beam patterns of various lamps:

http://www.overlander.com/pages_faq/faq_lamps.tpl?cart=31010846631634722

 

[scotty305]

Peaty, I understand what you're saying; removing the blocking cap from one's fog lights does not provide the same amount of light or the same spread pattern as a set of PIAA's or Hella's. But what it does is provide more light and preserve the factory low-and-wide spread pattern. This is plenty of light for my purposes.

Most of my fun roads are low-speed mountain roads, with lots of very tight corners, and plenty of blind corners. I don't need to light up the road a mile in front of me. Most of the time I'm in 2nd or sometimes 3rd gear, and my high beams light up the road in front of me pretty well. I use my (modified) fog lights strictly for illuminating the road right around the corner.

On a side note, have you driven in a car with foglights modified like mine? If not, then how can you know whether or not my lights "just scatter the light willy nilly and blind people and squirrels. " ? Speaking from experience, I can say that they are noticeably brighter, and they light up the road better than they used to.


-scott-