Thanks to Billf6531 for the basics... Bill, if I've left out a step, or you see need for improvements or adjustments, please let me know!

The red rear lenses in the bumper are intended for rear fog lights in the foreign versions of the 4Runner such as the Hilux Surf. Bill mentioned he enabled the use of these light housings for auxillary stop/turn/signal lamps. (or you can wire for rear fogs as intended) I decided to do this and provide this easy to follow write up so so others could add this useful safety feature.

Please also refer to HRunner's thread 4 pix:
http://www.toyota-4runner.org/showth...515#post118515

Liability: the author (moi) and this site assumes no responsibility for damages caused by performing modifications on your vehicle. These instructions are accurate to the best of my knowledge, but I'm not responsible for any errors that these instructions may contain, or any differences between your car and mine. If you don't feel comfortable working with automotive electrical wiring, please let someone with some experience perform this modification.

Warranty: the modifications described in this document could potentially void any manufacturer's warranty you may have left on the car (not likely, but possible nonetheless). You assume all responsibility if your car is still covered by warranty.

PARTS NEEDED:

• 10MM Socket (having a small handled socket wrench helps)
  
  
• Pliers (regular and needle nose)
  
  
• Small file (or a Dremel if you have one!)
  
  
• Some 14-18ga Wire
  
  
• Wire Cutter/Stripper
  
  
• Electric Drill
  
  
• 1 1/8 or 1 1/4" hole cutter
  
  
• Two 1 1/8" round snap in tail light sockets
  
  
• Two 1157 or equiv. bulbs to fit above sockets
  
  NOTE: Due to possible heat issues, you may want to consider using LED 1157 bulbs - the LEDs aren't likely to get as hot -- even with the vent caps removed, I noticed signs of heat buildup around the housing if the taillight function is wired up. If you use LED bulbs, it appears that they may only be used as Turn Signals and Brake lights OR Parking/Tail lights only... BUT NOT BOTH. Read this thread for complete details.
  
  
• A hot glue gun (may not be needed if you dremel opening to accept a snap in or screw in socket)
  
  
• Wire crimp on (tap) connectors
  
  
• Split wire tubing (optional)
  
  
• Electrical Tape
  
  
• Zip Ties (for securing wiring)
  
  

INSTRUCTIONS:

1. Remove the lenses.
Each rear red foglight lens housing is held in place with a single 10MM nut. You'll need to crawl under the rear and look up into the bumper to see it. Loosen it with a 10MM socket and you can remove it by hand. Pull the lens out of the bumper.

2. Make a hole for the bulb sockets.
Place light housing on a soft scratch free surface such as a towel.
You'll see that the spot where a bulb would normally go is sealed. And there's a little hex shaped nub in the center. Using a pair of pliers, break off the nub. Then drill a small pilot hole in the center of where the opening will be. Use the small hole cutter to CAREFULLY drill out the hole. GO SLOW! I ended up going just over half way and then broke out the hole carefully with a pair of needle nose pliers to avoid doing any damage. Check the opening for fitment of the bulb and socket and sand or file the edges as needed.

IMPORTANT NOTE REGARDING HEAT ISSUES!
I've found that filament type 1157 bulbs DO generate enough heat to melt the plastic in the extended "tube" of plastic" where the bulbs mount if run as tail lights. Recommend that you consider either using LED 1157 type bulbs, or dremel/saw off about 3/4" or more of the "tubular section" so that the bulb itself extends into the actual lamp housing when it's mounted and is not surrounded by the plastic.

2a. Remove the Vent Caps from each lense housing!!!
They are little rubber caps on the back of the housing -- simply pull them off. Forgot to do this the first time around and the bulbs overheated and shattered when I was running w/ taillights. The vent caps pull off easily and will expose an open hole to allow proper venting of heat generated by the bulb.

3. Insert bulbs into sockets
Self explanatory

4. Attach ground wire to socket (depends on socket)
The type of socket I purchased at NAPA did not have a ground wire -- the socket itself was ground. So you'll need to attach a ground wire to the socket since we're mounting this in a plastic light housing. I twisted a piece of wire around one of the crimps that help hold the socket in place. Solder would probably be a good idea, but the hot glue held mine in place nicely. Put a piece of tape on this wire to distinguish the ground wire from the others.

5. Install bulb and socket into lamp housing
Be careful when inserting.. it may be a snug fit and we don't want to break the bulbs. This is where the hot glue gun comes in. Chances are the socket won't stay in place very well on it's own, so carefully use the hot glue gun to make a light seam around the socket to hold it and the ground wire into place. (It can be cut thru later w/ a knife and reglued if the bulb needs to be replaced.)

NOTE FROM CRMARTIN'S INSTALL:
I didn't end up having to do any gluing when I did the mod. My bulbs stayed in sockets just fine so no gluing was necessary there. And I didn't have to glue to the sockets into the housing because I drilled out the hole with a 1" drill bit and slowly filed the opening larger to the point that the socket fit into the hole very tightly and securely. It was a slow process, but at least now I can get to it to change bulbs in the future.

Take his advice and take the time to file... I was in a hurry and took the glue shortcut. If you have the time and talent, you could probably use a dremel tool and utilize a diff type of socket as well!

6. Test ground wire connection.
By now you should have a bulb and socket firmly installed into the lamp housing. Test your ground wire connection by attaching it to a 9V battery or using the terminals inside the trailer hitch connector. We just want to ensure the bulb lights up to ensure you have a good ground on the socket.

6a Identify the Brake / Signal wires.
(Thanks YabeDude) Before installing, make sure you test the bulbs to identify the brake wire. It will be the brightest of the two. (mark it w/ a piece of tape) The other will be the signal wire.

7. Attach wire extensions to the bulb socket
The wires that come w/ the bulb socket are rather short, making it difficult to crimp on addtional wire once the lamp is reinstalled -- so save yourself the trouble and attach about 3-4 feet of wire to each of the leads. (you can cut it shorter later) Be sure theres enough wire to reach the area behind the trailer connector after the lamps are installed.

8. Reinstall the assembled lights.
Carefully tuck the wires into the open hole in the bumper and reinsert the lamp housings. Reach up and hand tighten the 10MM nuts first. Then tighten with socket wrench. You don't want them rattling loose and falling off or the lenses will fall off too.

9. Install split wire loom.
If you have split wire loom, put it on the wires and carefully route up and around to where the trailer connector is.

10. Connect the wiring.
At the trailer connecter there's a bunch of wires that lead up to it. Go back a little further where the wires join from the tail lights to the connector. Using crimp connectors, attach the marked ground wire and the leads as follows to the wires leading to the trailer connector:


NOTE: Toyota does not use the same colors as a standard 7 pin connector. (To help you find the wires needed, there's a cluster of brown, red, blue and yellow that go off one plug underneath near the trailer connector -- you may need to unwrap some of the tape to see the colored wires)

• Ground wires from each light go to the THICK WHITE WIRE W/ BLACK STRIPE (ground) leading to the connector
  
  
• One lead of RIGHT bulb/lens goes to BROWN (right turn/stop) hot wire leading to the connector
  
  
• One lead of LEFT bulb/lens lead goes to RED (left turn/stop) hot wire leading to the connector
  
  
• Remaing leads go to the THIN GREEN W/ BLACK STRIPE wire (tail lights) leading to the connector
  

NOTE:
If you do not want auxillary taillights, then do not connect the grn/blk wire) I did, because I have tailshade covers installed and the tail light intensity is slightly reduced -- the extra lights in the rear can be useful in inclement weather or if one of the stock taillights burn out.

11. Test the lights
Have someone hit the brakes, use turn signals, turn on hazards and headlights/taillights to ensure bulbs work properly. Left and right bulbs should work with associated amber turn signals. Both lenses light up when parking/headlights are turned on. Both lenses light up intensely when brakes are applied. Both lenses flash brightly when hazard lights are activated along with amber signals. (ie; two flashing amber and two flashing red all illuminate at the same time.

ADDENDUM: If by chance you drop, break, crack, spindle, mutillate or otherwise damage one of these rear red lenses, you CAN get replacements via partznet.com, but they're not cheap!

PARTZNET LINK FOR REPLACEMENTS:http://www.trademotion.com/partlocat...15&catalogid=2

NOTE: If you perform this mod, please post pictures of your work!

__________________
Black 2003 SR5 V6 4WD (Option Pkg C) ClearBra, painted pinstripes Mods: Rear glass limo tinted/ fronts 27%, Sunroof Deflector, Auto Dimming Mirror, VVT-i emblem, Homelink, Valor Tip -- Aftermarket: Weathertech Deflector, AVS Ventvisors & Tailshade tail light blackouts, Silver Star bulbs, 7.2" Widescreen TV/DVD, PNI Wayfinder Compass, K&N Air Filter (Part #33-2281), Husky Cargo Liner, Wood Trim Kit, Third Brake Light Flasher, Amber Whelen Slimlighter (aux. rear hazard warning) Rear foglamp housings modifed for aux. tail/brake/signals/hazard (See Rear Fog Mod Thread here : http://www.toyota-4runner.org/showth...threadid=1137)

Hey,
Got any pics of the final result? Really interested to see how it turned out.

Jon

__________________
2004 4Runner SR5 V6 4x4
Titanium Metallic
Nifty Catch-All Premium Floor Mats

Photo of end result can be seen in my avatar. (brake lights shown) Basically the red lenses act as aux brake/turn/signal/hazard lights.

__________________
Black 2003 SR5 V6 4WD (Option Pkg C) ClearBra, painted pinstripes Mods: Rear glass limo tinted/ fronts 27%, Sunroof Deflector, Auto Dimming Mirror, VVT-i emblem, Homelink, Valor Tip -- Aftermarket: Weathertech Deflector, AVS Ventvisors & Tailshade tail light blackouts, Silver Star bulbs, 7.2" Widescreen TV/DVD, PNI Wayfinder Compass, K&N Air Filter (Part #33-2281), Husky Cargo Liner, Wood Trim Kit, Third Brake Light Flasher, Amber Whelen Slimlighter (aux. rear hazard warning) Rear foglamp housings modifed for aux. tail/brake/signals/hazard (See Rear Fog Mod Thread here : http://www.toyota-4runner.org/showth...threadid=1137)

Thanks for the pics.
I must say it looks very cool, and more importantly usefull. :thumb:

Good mod and good write up.

One of these days I may end up doing it too, but for now it goes on the ever growing list.

__________________
2004 4Runner SR5 V6 4x4
Titanium Metallic
Nifty Catch-All Premium Floor Mats

Thanks for the excellent write-up. I followed it and didn't have any problems doing the mod myself last weekend. Looks pretty cool! And certainly doesn't hurt to be more visible to those New Jersey nitwik drivers...

Chris

OK, I'll ask the obvious dumb question -- since you glued the lights into the housing, how will you change the bulbs?

Jason B., can you get the Japanese version of these lights so we don't have to glue the lights in?

__________________
2003 SR5 V6 4WD Titanium with cladding

I didn't end up having to do any gluing when I did the mod. My bulbs stayed in sockets just fine so no gluing was necessary there. And I didn't have to glue to the sockets into the housing because I drilled out the hole with a 1" drill bit and slowly filed the opening larger to the point that the socket fit into the hole very tightly and securely. It was a slow process, but at least now I can get to it to change bulbs in the future.

Patience certainly pays off.. I was in a hurry and wanted a quick solution. The idea of filing is a good one. The hot glue is easily cut with a knife or box cutter. The first time around I neglected to remove the vent covers and the bulb burst because it overheated inside. If the problem pops up again, I'm going to use LED bulbs instead.

Where abouts is West Windsor? I was in the NJ/NY area earlier this week visiting customers in Princeton and Manhattan. I left the driving up to the local taxi/limo/bus drivers this trip.

__________________
Black 2003 SR5 V6 4WD (Option Pkg C) ClearBra, painted pinstripes Mods: Rear glass limo tinted/ fronts 27%, Sunroof Deflector, Auto Dimming Mirror, VVT-i emblem, Homelink, Valor Tip -- Aftermarket: Weathertech Deflector, AVS Ventvisors & Tailshade tail light blackouts, Silver Star bulbs, 7.2" Widescreen TV/DVD, PNI Wayfinder Compass, K&N Air Filter (Part #33-2281), Husky Cargo Liner, Wood Trim Kit, Third Brake Light Flasher, Amber Whelen Slimlighter (aux. rear hazard warning) Rear foglamp housings modifed for aux. tail/brake/signals/hazard (See Rear Fog Mod Thread here : http://www.toyota-4runner.org/showth...threadid=1137)

West Windsor is right next to Princeton. (It's where those of us who can't afford to live in Princeton and own a personal fleet of Lexus RX330's reside...)

I tried your Rear Foglight mod, and it works good. A couple of questions though, do both the right and the left have a ground, and if so what happens if I connect both grounds to the white wire(which is what I did) per your instructions? Thanks

__________________
Victor
08 FJ TT
94 FZJ80

Theres only a single ground wire coming off the hitch wire harness. Ours is White w/ black stripe (or black w/ big white stripe, depending on how you look at it) Both lights should be grounded there. Here's a pic of how a typical 7 pole trailer hitch is wired: (note it doesn't fully match what Toyota did)




2003 4RUNNER WIRES:
(Ground) = thick white wire w/ black stripe
(right turn/stop) = Brown
(left turn/stop) = Red
(tail lights) = green w/ black stripe

__________________
Black 2003 SR5 V6 4WD (Option Pkg C) ClearBra, painted pinstripes Mods: Rear glass limo tinted/ fronts 27%, Sunroof Deflector, Auto Dimming Mirror, VVT-i emblem, Homelink, Valor Tip -- Aftermarket: Weathertech Deflector, AVS Ventvisors & Tailshade tail light blackouts, Silver Star bulbs, 7.2" Widescreen TV/DVD, PNI Wayfinder Compass, K&N Air Filter (Part #33-2281), Husky Cargo Liner, Wood Trim Kit, Third Brake Light Flasher, Amber Whelen Slimlighter (aux. rear hazard warning) Rear foglamp housings modifed for aux. tail/brake/signals/hazard (See Rear Fog Mod Thread here : http://www.toyota-4runner.org/showth...threadid=1137)

Perfect, thats excatcly what I did, I grouded both lights at the white wire. Also does it matter it I only used 18g wire to connect both lights?

__________________
Victor
08 FJ TT
94 FZJ80

18 GA wire should be fine for just two extra bulbs... it will fit nicely into the split wire loom to keep things looking neat and tidy. Take some pics.. I'd like to see how it looks on other's rigs.

__________________
Black 2003 SR5 V6 4WD (Option Pkg C) ClearBra, painted pinstripes Mods: Rear glass limo tinted/ fronts 27%, Sunroof Deflector, Auto Dimming Mirror, VVT-i emblem, Homelink, Valor Tip -- Aftermarket: Weathertech Deflector, AVS Ventvisors & Tailshade tail light blackouts, Silver Star bulbs, 7.2" Widescreen TV/DVD, PNI Wayfinder Compass, K&N Air Filter (Part #33-2281), Husky Cargo Liner, Wood Trim Kit, Third Brake Light Flasher, Amber Whelen Slimlighter (aux. rear hazard warning) Rear foglamp housings modifed for aux. tail/brake/signals/hazard (See Rear Fog Mod Thread here : http://www.toyota-4runner.org/showth...threadid=1137)

This is the final result

Attached Images

 

__________________
Victor
08 FJ TT
94 FZJ80

Nice work.

This is what the factory ones look like:

__________________
Woody
2003 HILUX Surf Multimode 4WD, Rear Torsen LSD & a few mods