The PT Cruiser Blog: The 22nd mod, Twin Fog & Reversing Lights

I've never been keen on cars with just one fog light and one reversing light on the other side, it just doesn't look right. Granted, the Cruiser has red lenses by default, masking the white of the reversing light, but we all know it's there really!

So, following the Altezza Fog Lights mod, I was left with one white bulb for the reversing light and one red bulb for the fog light. I was also left rather unimpressed, considering the lengths I'd gone to in the past to fit the entire car out with chrome bulbs, so something had to be done.

The Altezza Fog Lights I bought had a couple of holes drilled in them already where strobes were used by the previous owner, so I thought I'd make use of the holes and convert the lights to run twin fogs and twin reversing lights, all in the one lens. The plan was to have the normal 3157 type bulbs as fogs and add some smaller clear bulbs for the reversing lights.

I started off by drilling out the existing hole already made, but just the outer skin first, leaving the hole in the reflector itself a little smaller:

The reason for this was to allow the bulb holder to remain completely hidden and only have the bulb itself on view. The Clear Side Repeaters I bought previously came with bulb holders that I didn't need, so not being one to waste anything, these seemed ideal to hold the reversing lights. I chopped one up (I had loads) and soldered a couple of wires on to test all this out in theory before committing to anything:

I then used a Dremmel to make the outer hole just the right size for the holder:

The bulb holders were then be smeared with mastic to both seal them and to hold them in place. I would have used Superglue or something stronger, but Superglue fumes plus clear plastic don't mix well, also if a bulb blew, I'd need to break something to change it. Mastic is waterproof, pliable and easily removed if ever I did need to change a bulb. Here's what it looks like with the new bulb and holder fitted (ignore the crap led bulb, that was a wiring test for another mod):

So with the lenses suitably modified, it was now time to do the wiring. First I removed both of the existing lenses and ran two lengths of suitable gauge wire between the two light apertures. This was quite easy to do, there is a hollow void inside the bumper so the wire fed through very easily:

There are two lengths of wire here as one needs to run from the existing fog on the right to the new fog on the left and the other length of wire needs to run from the existing reversing lamp on the left, to the new one on the right (with me?).

I then chopped off the bulb holder / plug from the existing reversing lamp, as I needed this to become the bulb holder for the new / extra fog light. The plug was rewired onto one length of wire. The other end of this wire was then spliced into the existing fog wiring on the right hand side. You need to be careful at this point. If you plan on using ordinary bulbs, no problem, but if you plan on using LED bulbs, you have to get the polarity the right way round or the LED bulbs won't light up.

At this stage I now had two wired up fog lights and no reversing lights. With the bare wires left over from chopping the plug off the reversing light, I attached one of the new bulb holders for the reversing lights. I also then attached the second length of wire which would power the other / new reversing light. Again, if you plan on using LEDs for the reversing lights (not recommended in this mod due to the small size/brightness) be sure to check your polarity.

So once the wiring was done, I simply screwed the Altezza Fog Lights back in, applied a dab of chrome paint to the screws and Bob was indeed my mothers brother: